All week we have been examining how safe city homeless shelters really are. In the fourth part of her series Unsafe Haven, NY1's Courtney Gross takes a closer look at one of the shelters struggling to keep drugs and violence at bay.
The sounds of hip hop lightly stream out from behind a locked gate.
"Come to Forbell, it's all here," one man said from behind it.
Inside, there are about 194 homeless men temporarily seeking refuge. This is the Forbell Men's Shelter in East New York.
"People in there treat us like animals, dogs," one resident said. "You got more drugs than you got food in there."
Some of those men say Forbell resembles more of a prison than a homeless shelter.
"I don't think this is the proper place for me," one shelter resident said. "Most of the time I am afraid of people."
"Listen to me: half of us are drunkards," another said.
NY1 analyzed nearly 1,700 critical incidents at homeless shelters across the city from 2015, and Forbell Men's Shelter had 60, the highest number of any single site.
"It's pretty rough," resident Phillip Johnson said. "But thank God I get through."
Many of the critical incidents were fights between these men. Other incidents were more severe.
In one case, two men were arguing. One of them threatened to kill the other, claiming to have a gun. When he was asked about it later, the man said, "Yes, I bring it in with me every night." He then pulled the gun out and showed it.
Then there are drugs. In August last year, a security officer found one man in the second floor bathroom attempting to use heroin. When he was asked to give up the needle and exit the bathroom, the man refused and decided to exit Forbell instead.
Gross: Do you think there are a lot of drugs or violence inside?
Man: I do not know, because I am not involved in that, you know, situation.
The shelter has been run by the nonprofit Samaritan Village. The city told NY1 that the nonprofit group runs a substance abuse treatment system, which includes assessing their homeless clients and diverting people to treatment programs. The city says the shelter is dealing with a population with long histories of substance abuse.
Samaritan Village had no response to our story.
While the men at the shelter certainly hope the situation at Forbell gets better, they note that it is not the only one dealing with problems of security, drugs, and violence.
"I've been to two or three other shelters, and from what I have witnessed with myself this is not the only shelter like this," Johnson said.
The police department is currently reviewing security at all homeless shelters, including those run by nonprofits or private entities like the Forbell Men's Shelter.