Suspect dies in custody at Manhattan Criminal Court, second death there in month

Graham Rayman, Rocco Parascandola and Thomas Tracy, New York Daily News on Mar 26, 2025

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NEW YORK — A man awaiting arraignment on low-level drug charges at a Lower Manhattan courthouse died early Wednesday, law enforcement sources said.

The 44-year-old man had been arrested about 14 hours earlier and was in a holding pen at Manhattan Criminal Court when he died, the sources said. It wasn’t immediately clear how he died and his identity was not immediately released.

He had yet to be arraigned and therefore was still in NYPD custody, making the death also the second in police custody in a city courthouse in a week, sources familiar with the case said. He was arrested Tuesday in Manhattan on a misdemeanor drug possession charge and had outstanding warrants for prior drug arrests in October, the sources said.

The death is the second at the Manhattan courthouse in a month.

On Feb. 24, Terence Moore, 55, died in Correction Department custody at Manhattan Criminal Court after suffering a possible seizure in a holding cell. A Board of Correction report said he was seen smoking a possible narcotic right before he went into medical distress.

On Friday, Soso Ramishvili, 32, died in police custody at Brooklyn Criminal Court while awaiting arraignment. He had been in custody for three days after a shoplifting arrest on March 18.

Public defender groups decried Ramishvili’s death after his arrest for attempted shoplifting of $213 in power tools.

“This person, who should have been granted a desk appearance and released based on the offense, languished in pain in custody for three days and was deprived of medical care despite repeated pleas from defense lawyers and other personnel,” the Legal Aid Society and Brooklyn Defenders said in a statement.

There have been five jail deaths so far in 2025, matching the total in all of 2024. The most recent jail death was that of Sonia Reyes, who died March 20 at the West Facility on Rikers Island.

And Ariel Quidone died at Elmhurst Hospital on March 15 after collapsing at the Robert N. Davoren Center on Rikers. His family and lawyer said he suffered a burst appendix and had a severe infection. He had been in jail for just eight days.

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