NEW YORK — A man being held on Rikers Island died early Saturday, the 10th inmate being housed in city jails to die this year.

City Department of Correction officials confirmed the death, claiming inmate Ardit Billa was found “unresponsive in his cell” at the George R. Vierno Center at 12:25 a.m.

DOC officers conducting a tour of the cells rendered aid as medical support was called, but Billa died just before 1 a.m.

Correction Commissioner Lynelle Maginley-Liddie promised a “full review of the circumstances surrounding the incident.” An autopsy has been slated to determine a cause of death.

Billa, 29, had been on Rikers since Feb. 23, according to the DOC website.

He was initially arrested on Jan. 22 after he was accused of slashing a 52-year-old neighbor in the face and lip with a razor during a fight inside his Liberty Avenue apartment building in East New York, Brooklyn.

His victim was taken to an area hospital with minor injuries.

Cops recovered the razor, as well as an amount of crack, on his person and arrested him for assault and weapons possession. However, he was released without bail, according to court records.

After he failed to make his first court appearance, a warrant was issued for his arrest. He was taken into custody on Feb. 23 and ordered held on $25,000 bail.

On Aug. 5, a judge referred Billa’s case to an alternative court program, but he hadn’t been released from jail, court records indicate.

Billa’s death brings the city’s jail-related death tally to 10 so far this year — already double the amount of inmates that died at New York City jail facilities in 2024.

Last month, Edwin Quispe, 33, was found unresponsive in a bathroom at Rikers’ Eric M. Taylor Center and also declared dead, officials said. The cause and circumstances are still under investigation.

Rikers Island is mandated by law to be closed by 2027 and replaced by smaller borough jails. But the bold plan is already up to a half-decade behind schedule because the new jails won’t be finished in time, a commission appointed to review the plans said in March.

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