Robert Longworth was awarded First Place in memoir in the PEN American Center’s 2010 Prison Writing Contest, for his piece about life in solitary confinement in the Intensive Management Unit, or IMU, at the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla. Longworth provides this biography on the PEN website: “I am a forty-five year old state-raised prisoner. And, […]
Month: August 2010
"I Spent 29 Years in Solitary Confinement"
Angola 3 member Robert King describes his experience in The Guardian. Some excerpts: It was a dimly lit box, 9ft by 6ft, with bars at the front facing on to the bare cement walls of a long corridor. Inside was a narrow bed, a toilet, a fixed table and chair, and an air vent set into […]
Down Time for Solitary Watch
One of us is out of town, and one of us has a broken wrist and only one usable typing hand. So for the time being, posts on SW will be sporadic and brief. You can also follow us on Twitter–or here in the sidebar–for links to related news from around the web. Thanks for […]
"Outsourcing Punishment" and the Privatization of Justice
It’s common knowledge, at this point, that the move toward private prisons has made conditions in the American corrections system even more dismal than it was before, as private contractors cut costs and services in order to maximize profits. But even more than this, outsourcing punishment to the private sector constitutes a privatization of justice itself. That’s the point made […]
Solitary Confinement Is a "Challenge for Medical Ethics"
Anyone interested in solitary confinement should be aware of this article in the most recent issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law: “Solitary Confinement and Mental Illness in U.S. Prisons: A Challenge for Medical Ethics,” by Jeffrey L. Metzner, MD and Jamie Fellner, Esq. Metzner is a respected forensic psychiatrist and professor at the University of […]
Obama’s First Military Tribunal: Child Soldier Tortured at Bagram and Gitmo
Today, the Obama Administration will begin its first trial of a prisoner held at Guantanamo Bay. The defendant is Omar Khadr, a Canadian national who was 15 when his alleged crime took place eight years ago. Since that time, Khadr has been abused, threatened, and held is solitary confinement for long periods at both Bagram and Gitmo. Daphne Eviatar […]
Voices from Solitary: Life on Level 3, Texas Death Row
In many prisons, there are different “levels” of solitary confinement, with differences in their living conditions, degree of isolation, and the handful of “privileges”–visits, phone calls, personal hygenine products and reading materials, and in some cases even blankets–afforded to prisoners there. At Lousiana’s Angola prison, for example, there are three levels of solitary confinement: The long-term solitary isolation unit is called […]
Voices from Solitary: Gang "Validation" and Permanent Isolation in California Prisons
In prisons throughout the country, perceived gang membership is one of the leading reasons for placement in solitary confinement. In California alone, hundreds of prisoners are in Security Housing Units (SHUs) because they have been “validated” as gang members. The validation procedure used by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) employs such criteria as tattoos, reading materials, […]
"Epidemic" of Suicides in Massachusetts Prisons
On July 15, an inmate hanged himself in his cell at the Old Colony Correctional Center in Bridgewater, bringing the number of suicides in Massachusetts state prisons this year to eight. The rate of suicides, which so far averages one a month, is four times the national average. According to the Boston Globe, prisoner advocates’ “calls for an urgent response […]
Ridgeway on America's Solitary Confinement Nightmare
The title of this post is the title of an interview with SW founder James Ridgeway by Russell Mokhiber of the Corporate Crime Reporter. The interview was picked up by Common Dreams, Counterpunch, and others. In it, Ridgeway talks about the genesis of Solitary Watch and why, after 50 years as an investigative journalist, he began working on the […]
Pennsylvania Legislators Hold Hearings on Solitary Confinement
On Monday, members of the Pennsylvania House Judiciary Committee hosted public hearings on solitary confinement in Yeadon, a western suburb of Philadelphia. As reported in the local Delaware County Daily Times (and nowhere else): A public hearing on the effectiveness of solitary confinement in state prisons drew cheers from the audience for two former inmates and jeers […]
Federal Judge: Extended Solitary Confinement Causes "Lasting Psychological Damage and Emotional Harm"
In a follow-up to a recent ruling by a federal judge that prisoners at Tamms state supermax in Illinois do not receive due process, the Belleville News-Democrat reports on some significant features of the judge’s written decision. As George Pawlaczyk and Beth Hundsforfer write, the judge’s statement supports researchers’ findings that extended solitary confinement not only exacerbates mental illness, but causes […]