Rikers Guard Allegedly Joked About Getting Gang Tattoo After Kicking Inmate to Death

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One guard at New York's Rikers Island prison has plead guilty while two other guards were arrested Wednesday after federal prosecutors indicted the three on conspiracy charges in the 2012 beating death of an inmate.

Ex-Rikers guard Brian Coll, 45, has been arrested and charged with a range of offenses related to the kicking of burglary suspect Ronald Spear to death in December 2012. Coll was charged with conspiracy, obstruction of justice, filing a false report, and depriving a prisoner of his rights.

Current Rikers guard Byron Taylor, 31, was arrested along with Coll, and also faces charges of conspiracy and obstruction of justice for helping Coll restrain Spear during the incident, and then lying to investigators about it. The pair allegedly colluded with another guard, Anthony Torres, 49, to keep the incident under wraps. Torres has pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit obstruction of justice and filing a false report, authorities said.

According to WABC, Spear's attorneys said that the 52-year-old had complained that the Rikers guards retaliated against him for contacting lawyers about his kidney disease treatment.

In a criminal complaint written by the FBI's Vanessa M Tibbits, the agent claims the guards held Spear face-down on the floor, while Coll repeatedly kicked him. At one point, Coll lifted the inmate's head and said: "Remember that I'm the one who did this to you," before dropping his head again, Tibbits said.

Inmates who witnessed the incident reportedly shouted "They're kicking him!" and "They're killing him!" the complaint said.

About six or eight months after Spear's death, Coll reportedly asked a female corrections captain whether he should get a teardrop tattoo, the complaint added. Some gang members take up the teardrop tattoo after they kill another person. The corrections captain claimed Coll had proudly told her "I beat the case," after the state declined to press charges, the complaint said.

Lawyers for the defendants did not respond to requests for comment Wednesday.

A federal investigation was launched into the incident after state authorities said they would not charge the guards with the death. Preet Bharara, US attorney for the Southern District of New York, called the latest incident "more sad news out of Rikers Island."

"Rikers inmates, although walled off from the rest of society, are not walled off from the protections of our constitution," Bharara said at a press conference Wednesday in announcing the latest charges.

The city settled a $2.75 million lawsuit last year over the death, according to the Guardian.

Related: Kalief Browder — Teen Imprisoned at Rikers Island for Three Years Without Trial — Dies by Suicide

Numerous claims of inmate violence and staff brutality toward prisoners at Rikers have been the subject of dozens of lawsuits filed against the prison and city operators in recent years. Six months ago, federal prosecutors announced plans to sue the city of New York, which runs the prison, over civil rights violations, especially in the prison's handling of adolescent prisoners.

That announcement in December followed a 79-page report lambasting the New York City Department of Correction for failing to protect the teens, citing a "deep-seated culture of violence" towards these inmates and others.

Over the weekend, news emerged that a young man who had been held at Rikers for three years without trial from age 16 had died by suicide. He had been beaten by guards and inmates alike throughout his detention and locked up in solitary confinement for two years.