This building stopped being the Correctional Institution for Men in July 2000, so paperwork carrying that name still sends families looking for a jail that no longer answers to it. The search below reaches the city's own Person in Custody Lookup.
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You cannot search the Eric M. Taylor Center on its own. New York City runs one Person in Custody Lookup for the whole Department of Correction, and what it gives back is the building someone is currently in. So the search is citywide and the answer is specific, which is the right way round for a family holding an envelope and needing to know where to send it.
The lookup gives you two ways in.
A NYSID or a Book and Case number. Both are exact and both return one person. The NYSID is a New York State identification number. The Book and Case number is assigned by the Department of Correction when somebody is admitted.
A first name and a last name. This is the route most families take, because in the first days nobody has a number yet. A common name returns a list and you pick from it.
There is no separate Eric M. Taylor Center search box, and there does not need to be. The lookup tells you the current jail as part of the result.
This building was the Correctional Institution for Men until July 14, 2000, when the department renamed it after retired Chief of Department Eric M. Taylor.
That matters more than a name change usually would, because the old name outlived the change. It sits in older court paperwork, in old letters, in directory listings and in the memory of anybody who dealt with the island before 2000. A family working from any of those is searching for a facility that no longer exists under that name, at an address that never changed.
Same building. Same 10-10 Hazen Street. Different name since 2000.
The lookup answers one question that the address on your envelope cannot: which of the island’s jails holds your person today.
Eric M. Taylor Center is 10-10 Hazen Street. Its immediate neighbours are 09-09 and 11-11, and those are different jails. All of them are East Elmhurst, NY 11370, so every element of the address except the building number is shared.
That is why the check is worth making before each letter. Getting the street, the city and the ZIP right still leaves you one number away from a letter that has to be forwarded.
Both dates come from the department’s own facilities page. It houses males, in New York City Department of Correction custody. The department is more specific about some of its other jails, saying “detained and sentenced male adults” for the George R. Vierno Center, so the shorter phrasing here is how the department itself describes this jail, not a gap in our reading of it.
The tool carries its own warning, and it explains most failed searches: it is not for persons in custody in police, state, or federal custody.
Somebody arrested by the New York Police Department is in police custody through arrest, processing and arraignment. They are not in Department of Correction custody yet and they do not appear. The department publishes no timing for how long that takes, so an empty result in the first hours is a sign the process is still running rather than a sign anything has gone wrong.
At the other end, a state sentence moves somebody into the New York State system and out of this tool entirely.
There is no family notification when a person is moved between jails on the island, and nothing the department publishes suggests otherwise.
So the first sign of a move is usually something going wrong: a letter that takes a fortnight, a deposit made against an old record, a journey across the bridge to the wrong building. Running the search again costs a minute and is the only thing standing between you and any of those.
6 of 8 questions
Yes. The New York City Person in Custody Lookup takes a first name and a last name, which is the route most families use because nobody has a Book and Case number in the first days. A common name returns a list to choose from. The result names the jail, and for this building it reads Eric M. Taylor Center.
Inmate SearchNo, and there does not need to be. New York City runs one lookup for the whole Department of Correction and the result tells you which jail somebody is in. Searching citywide and reading the building off the result is the same thing as searching this building, and it also catches a move you did not know about.
Inmate SearchBecause that name was retired on July 14, 2000, when the department renamed the building the Eric M. Taylor Center after a retired Chief of Department. The building did not move and did not close. Search by the person's name instead of by the facility, and the result will name the jail for you.
Inmate SearchNot to search, but you will want it afterwards. It goes on every envelope beside the person's full name, it is needed for deposits, and the visit centre works from it. Write it down the first time the lookup shows it to you rather than searching for it again each time you need it.
Inmate SearchThe person's current location and basic case information. For a family the location is the piece that matters, because six jails operate on Rikers Island and each has its own address on Hazen Street. The result also carries a Send Money button that routes through to the transfer agents.
Inmate SearchBecause the lookup covers Department of Correction custody, not police custody, and it says so on the tool. Through arrest, processing and arraignment the person is with the police and will not appear. No timing is published for booking, so an empty result early on means the process is still running.
Inmate SearchOnly if you run it again. There is no notification to families when somebody is moved between jails on the island, so the search itself is the notification. Checking before each letter, each deposit and each visit is the whole of the protection available to you here.
Inmate SearchThe department does not publish a figure for this building. It gives a 1964 build date and a 1973 expansion and says the jail houses males, and that is the extent of it. Where a bed count exists the department prints it, so no figure here means no published figure rather than one we could not find.
Inmate SearchOne visit centre serves every jail on the island, and it is not at 10-10 Hazen Street.
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View ArticleNothing is scanned, so the paper you post is the paper that arrives.
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All information on this page comes directly from official government and facility sources. How we verify information › Last verified September 16, 2026.