"What happens when you jam almost a dozen jails, bulging at the seams with society's cast-offs, onto a spit of landfill, purposefully hidden from public view and named after the family of a judge who sent escaped slaves and free Black men to plantations in the South? Prize-winning journalists Graham Rayman and Reuven Blau have spent two years interviewing more than 130 people comprising a broad cross-section of lives Rikers has touched-from detainees and their relatives to officers, lawyers, and commissioners, with stories spanning from the 1970s to the present day. The deeply personal accounts that emerge call into question the very nature of justice in America. Offering a 360-degree view inside the country's largest detention complex for the first time, their voices take readers on a harrowing journey into every corner of Rikers--a failed society unto itself that reflects society's failings as a whole"-- Provided by publisher.

Includes index.

Prologue -- First day : "A city within a city" -- Linus : "There was no plan B" -- Bullpen therapy : "A life sentence, thirty days at a time" -- Race : "It's a different type of plantation mentality" -- Gangs : "Dude, that's a Latin King tattoo on his chest" -- Violence : "I've walked with the razor in my mouth" -- Solitary : "Nobody can hear the wheels squeak anymore" -- Mental health : "Cupcake gerbil face" -- Medical care : "Factory of despair" -- Pregnancy : "The house of pregnant girls" -- Food : "That's when I became a vegetarian" -- Contraband : "People made weapons out of bones" -- Minister : "We get our gun in" -- Riots : "All pandemonium broke loose" -- Escapes : "Ron, you couldn't pick a better name than John Hancock?" -- Cos : "When the music stops, you better have a seat" -- Teens : "They used to call it Vietnam or gladiator school" -- Celebrities : "Yo, could you listen to this for me?" -- LGBTQ : "They had what they called homosexual housing" -- Conditions : "Er, uh, uh, we need a plan - We'll be submitting a plan" -- Visitation : "A humiliation process" -- Death : "There were some rosaries and beads" -- Humanity : "When we lose the art of being human, we stop becoming" -- COVID-19 : "If this comes to Rikers, we're all screwed" -- Jacobson : "Nice Jewish boy winds up correction commissioner" -- Stats : "They sit down and put their little story together" -- Unions : "Serious violence is routinized" -- Close Rikers : "Executive summary : damned if I know" -- Last day : "Don't ever look back or else you'll come back" -- After Rikers -- Note to readers -- Acknowledgments -- Credits -- Index.