• “Between 2012 and 2015, nine inmates in the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester took their own lives, giving Oklahoma’s only state-owned maximum security prison the highest suicide rate among corrections facilities,” according to an article published by Oklahoma Watch. All were in a type of isolated confinement when they died. • “A North Carolina […]
Delaware
Seven Days in Solitary [2/5/2017]
• The Allegheny County Jail has eased up on discipline and worked towards releasing incarcerated pregnant women, according to an article published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Five people locked up at Allegheny sued the jail last December, on allegations that they had been place in solitary, sometimes for weeks, for minor offenses like having too […]
Seven Days in Solitary [12/11/2016]
• Federal appellate judges decided a lawsuit can proceed against officials at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego, after correctional officers allegedly forced a prisoner to live in a solitary confinement cell flooded with raw sewage. Raul Arellano filed the lawsuit in October 2014, claiming that what occurred violated his Eighth Amendment […]
Seven Days in Solitary [8/14/2016]
• California is considering new legislation that would sharply limit the use of solitary confinement for children. Under the law, which has passed the state Senate and is awaiting a vote in the Assembly, a child could only be placed in isolation if they posed a risk to themselves, others or the facility, and would […]
Lawsuit Charges Delaware Prison System With Neglect and Solitary Confinement of Mentally Ill
Last month, the Community Legal Aid Society Inc. (CLASI), along with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), filed a lawsuit against the head of the Delaware Department of Correction (DOC) over the department’s treatment of incarcerated people suffering from mental illness. CLASI argues that the DOC’s current practices violate the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. […]
Seven Days in Solitary [8/30/2015]
The following roundup features noteworthy news, reports, and opinions on solitary confinement from the past week that have not been covered in other Solitary Watch posts. • A 68-year-old woman from North Carolina was arrested and put in solitary as punishment for having walked away from a halfway house almost 40 years ago because of […]
Seven Days in Solitary [8/9/2015]
The following roundup features noteworthy news, reports and opinions on solitary confinement from the past week that have not been covered in other Solitary Watch posts. • Four United States senators introduced a bill that would prohibit the solitary confinement of children tried in the federal system and held in pretrial facilities and juvenile detention facilities. […]
Seven Days in Solitary [2/8/2015]
The following roundup features noteworthy news, reports and opinions on solitary confinement from the past week that have not been covered in other Solitary Watch posts. • The American Civil Liberties Union and the Texas Civil Rights Project released a report on the use of the solitary confinement in the state’s prisons. According to the report, Texas […]