Metro

Rikers Island ‘impostor’ worked with kids at charity despite being sex offender

JAIL FAIL: The Post yesterday broke the story of Matthew Matagrano, a sex offender who infiltrated Rikers Island and wreaked havoc. (
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The convicted child rapist busted for allegedly sneaking into Rikers Island and impersonating a correction officer spends his days working with at-risk youths — despite being a registered sex offender.

Matthew Matagrano, who wandered unfettered through restricted facilities on Rikers Island and courthouses in The Bronx and Manhattan, counsels troubled teens for Civil Advocates of New York.

“He does good work and he does good presentations in various schools,” said Talib Faran, chairman of the Brooklyn-based charity, which focuses on helping ex-offenders, adding he was unaware of Matagrano’s past as a high-risk sex offender.

Matagrano, 36, has been with the charity since 1997 — a year after being convicted of sodomizing a 15-year-old boy.

He was busted again in 2004 for sneaking into two elementary schools with a fraudulently obtained Department of Education ID and rifling through files.

It was Matagrano’s status as the charity’s paralegal that helped him obtain access passes to Rikers Island.

In one instance, he pretended to be from the Inspector General’s Office and tricked a commander into allowing him to visit an inmate in the most secure part of Rikers reserved for mobsters and escapees.

Matagrano walked him down one floor — uncuffed — and allowed him to chat with another prisoner, sources said.

Investigators are probing if Matagrano had inside help in his ruse.

They are also looking into why he was given the passes the he used to get into the island lockup, the sources said.

“This is a major, major breach, and it is the fault of the commissioner,” said Norman Seabrook, president of the Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association, referring to Correction Department chief Dora Schriro.

Schriro, the former head of Arizona’s prisons, was chastised after a 15-day hostage standoff at one of her prisons there in 2004.

A blue-ribbon panel cited inattention and complacency across the Arizona prison system under Schriro’s watch.

Matagrano remained behind bars yesterday. He is due back in court on Wednesday on charges of criminal impersonation, promoting prison contraband, and possession of stolen property.

Additional reporting by Chuck Bennett