Layleen Polanco's Estate Sues NYC Over Her Rikers Island Death

NEW YORK — New York City officials left Layleen Cubilette-Polanco, the epileptic transgender woman locked in Rikers Island on $500 bail, to die alone in her cell despite knowing she had potentially deadly medical problems, her estate alleges in a new lawsuit.

City officials put Cubilette-Polanco in solitary confinement even though she had epilepsy and schizophrenia — conditions that should have barred her from being placed there, says the complaint filed Monday in Brooklyn federal court.

Jail guards ignored Cubilette-Polanco for so long that her body was "cold to the touch" when she was finally found unresponsive on June 7, according to the lawsuit.

"Layleen is dead because the City of New York and its ... personnel failed to provide her safe housing, adequate medical care, and proper accommodation for her disabilities," reads the complaint brought by Cubilette-Polanco's mother, Aracelis Polanco, on behalf of her daughter's estate.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages as compensation for Cubilette-Polanco's death and as a penalty for the city and officials involved in it.

David B. Shanies, a lawyer for Cubilette-Polanco's estate, could not immediately be reached to discuss the lawsuit.

A spokesperson for Mayor Bill de Blasio did not directly address the allegations in the complaint, but said Cubilette-Polanco's death was "unacceptable."

"Our thoughts remain with Layleen Polanco’s, family, friends, and community," the spokesperson, Avery Cohen, said in a statement Monday afternoon. "Her death is particularly painful given the long and tragic history of injustice toward the transgender community, which we will not stand for. Any loss of life in our custody is unacceptable, and we must continue our work towards enacting long- term criminal justice reform."

Cubilette-Polanco was locked in the Rose M. Singer Center, Rikers's women's jail, in mid-April following her arrest for an alleged assault and kept there because of a $500 bail stemming from a separate 2017 case. The city's medical examiner found that she died from an epileptic seizure.

The city Department of Correction knew Cubilette-Polanco suffered from both epilepsy and schizophrenia, as she had multiple seizures while in the city's custody and spent about eight days in a hospital in May, the complaint says.

But she was nevertheless placed in solitary confinement for most of her waking hours around May 30, often getting no more than two hours a day outside her cell, according to the lawsuit.

Staffers with the DOC and Correctional Health Services, which provides medical care for city inmates, signed off on her solitary sentence despite city rules forbidding it for detainees with serious medical or psychiatric conditions, the complaint says. Her seizures should have been a red flag because they are a fairly common cause of death in jails, THE CITY has reported.

Two correction officers got no response when they knocked on Cubilette-Polanco's cell about two hours before she was found dead but did nothing to get her medical help, according to the lawsuit. One guard reportedly said she was "asleep," the filing says.

"The City’s deliberate indifference to the constitutional rights of inmates with serious medical needs in punitive segregation caused the death of Layleen Polanco," the complaint reads.

The complaint accuses the city and 28 correction officers and jail medical staff of violating Cubilette-Polanco's rights under the 14th Amendment and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Cubilette-Polanco's death sparked mourning in the city's LGBTQ community at the height of Pride Month along with calls for the city to end the use of solitary confinement on Rikers Island.

The 27-year-old was a member of the House of Xtravaganza, a well known community in the city's LGBT ballroom scene. Its members have been featured in the ballroom documentary "Paris is Burning" and the television series "Pose."

Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts senator and Democratic presidential candidate, cited Cubilette-Polanco's death in demanding an end to solitary confinement, calling the practice "cruel and inhumane." Mayor Bill de Blasio, who is also a White House hopeful, has said he is "not there yet."

The Department of Correction has said it is cooperating with an investigation of Polanco's death conducted by the Bronx District Attorney's Office and the Department of Investigation.

Read the complaint brought by Cubilette-Polanco's estate below.