Torture in Indiana Prisons
from: http://www.hrw.org/press97/oct/indiana.htm
Human Rights Watch Condemns Prolonged Confinement in Excessively Harsh Conditions in Indiana's Super-maximum Security Facilities
(New York, October 22, 1997)--The State of Indiana inflicts cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment on prisoners subjected to prolonged confinement in the excessively harsh conditions of the Maximum Control Facility (MCF) and the Secured Housing Unit of the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility (SHU) . In Cold Storage: Super-maximum Security Confinement in Indiana, released today, Human Rights Watch concludes that confining mentally ill prisoners at the MCF and the SHU can cause such great suffering as to constitute torture under international human rights law.
The Indiana Department of Corrections has the difficult job of securely housing disruptive or dangerous prisoners. But throwing them for years into the shocking conditions at the MCF and the SHU is beyond the pale," states Jamie Fellner, associate counsel of Human Rights Watch.
Prisoners are sent to the MCF and the SHU after breaking rules at other prisons. More than half of the prisoners at the SHU are severely mentally ill and for these prisoners, conditions of confinement can be unbearable. Confined for twenty-two to twenty-three hours a day in small single cells, all prisoners at Indiana's super-maximum security prisons face extraordinary isolation, complete idleness, limited environmental stimulation and few educational or vocational opportunities. They are never allowed to touch their families; all visits are conducted behind plexiglass partitions while the prisoners are handcuffed and shackled. At both facilities but particularly at the MCF during its early years of operation prisoners have endured excessive physical violence including beatings and unnecessary forced "cell extractions" carried out by teams of guards. After spending years shut off from each other and largely cut off from the outside world, many of these prisoners are abruptly released into the outside world.
Based on two visits to each facility over a three-year period, Human Rights Watch has concluded the conditions at these facilities reflect an excessively punitive approach to "problem" prisoners that does nothing to encourage their ability to reintegrate successfully into the general prison population or society. For some prisoners, the psychological consequences of supermaximum security confinement can be devastating. The Indiana Department of Corrections (DOC) has acknowledged that the harsh conditions at the MCF and the SHU are not necessary for all inmates and can be ameliorated without jeopardizing the goals of security and discipline.
The confinement of persons who are mentally ill in these facilities is particularly reprehensible. Mentally ill prisoners often end up in the MCF and the SHU because they are unable to adjust to therules and stresses of prison life. "To force prisoners with serious psychiatric disorders to live in extreme social isolation and unremitting idleness in a claustrophobic environment is barbaric," according to Dr. Carl Fulwiler, a psychiatrist who accompanied Human Rights Watch to visit the MCF and the SHU in July 1997 as a representative of Physicians for Human Rights. "The cruelty of confining them in the conditions which can aggravate their illness is compounded by the failure of the Indiana DOC to provide them with adequate mental health services."
The dangers of placing mentally ill prisoners in supermaximum security facilities is exemplified by the case of Edgar Hughes, an inmate at the SHU who had been hospitalized numerous times in his life with psychiatric problems. Hughes, who was actively psychotic and had had physical confrontations with guards, mysteriously suffered a head trauma on September 11, 1997. His injuries are so severe that the current prognosis is that he will remain in a vegetative state. The available facts suggest one of two explanations: either Hughes was severely beaten by guards or he suffered a psychiatric breakdown during which he deliberately injured himself. Either way, his confinement at the SHU caused a terrible tragedy. Human Rights Watch has called on Indiana authorities to carry out a thorough investigation of this incident and to hold accountable anyone responsible for his condition.
Based on its findings, Human Rights Watch makes the following recommendations:
1. Offer Treatment and Conditions of Confinement Appropriate for Mentally Ill Prisoners
The Indiana legislature should:
Enact legislation that bars the administrative or disciplinary segregation in conditions of extreme social isolation and reduced environmental stimulus of seriously mentally ill inmates or of inmates who are at significant risk of suffering a serious injury to their mental health if confined in such conditions.
Provide the Indiana DOC and/or the Department of Mental Health with the necessary financial resources to properly house and treat inmates who should not be confined at the SHU or MCF because of their mental health condition or histories.
The Indiana Department of Corrections should:
Develop, or collaborate with the Department of Mental Health to develop, secure facilities to house and treat mentally ill inmates who cannot be confined in the general prison population because of the safetyand security risks they pose, but who do not meet the existing criteria for in-patient hospitalization. These facilities should provide physical conditions and social interaction conducive to mental health and rehabilitation, and should be staffed by qualified mental health professionals.
Undertake a comprehensive mental health evaluation of all inmates currently confined at the MCF and the SHU to identify those who should be excluded from segregated confinement because they are currently suffering from a serious mental disorder, have a history of severe mental illness or whose mental condition (e.g., brain damage, mental retardation, chronic depression) makes them vulnerable to deterioration if they remain in those facilities.
Develop procedures to ensure that no prisoner sent to the MCF or to the SHU remains there for more than a brief period if they are persons for whom the risk is high that confinement in such facilities will cause serious mental health injury.
Provide frequent monitoring by qualified health professionals of inmates at the SHU and MCF to identify those who need mental health services.
Expand the range of mental health services available to inmates at the SHU and MCF, and grantinmates prompt access to such services.
Provide sufficient staff to meet prisoners' mental health needs. It should also provide adequate custodial staff to enable prisoners to be escorted as needed to meetings in private with mental health staff, medical visits, meetings with visitors, and other activities conducive to their mental well being and rehabilitation.
2. Reduce Periods of Solitary Confinement
The Indiana Department of Corrections should:
Discontinue the policy of indefinite administrative segregation. Inmates should be assigned to administrative segregation for a fixed term that is not excessively long. Inmates should be able to reduce their time in administrative segregation through good behavior. No inmate should be assigned to an additional period of administrative segregation within three months of a prior period of segregation. Exceptions to this rule should only be permitted upon a finding, following a hearing, that the inmate constitutes a serious danger to prison safety and security and cannot be safely confined in a less restrictive setting. Such an inmate should also receive a mental health evaluation by an independent psychiatrist who must certify that the inmate is not suffering from severe mental disorders that would be exacerbated by continued segregation.
Refrain from sentencing prisoners to disciplinary segregation at the MCF or the SHU for more than short periods of time unless they are guilty of extremely dangerous or violent actions, such as assaults against staff or prisoners causing serious bodily injury. Inmates should be able to reduce the period of disciplinary segregation through good behavior.
Review disciplinary policies with the goal of instituting greater proportionality between sanctions for rules infractions and the type of infraction and, in particular, to reduce the amount of disciplinary time awarded for nonviolent infractions.
Reduce the use of additional time in segregation as a punishment for violation of rules by segregated inmates. Explore alternatives that would serve the goal of promoting rule-abiding behavior by inmates without prolonging their time in segregation (e.g., use of increased privileges contingent on good behavior, training in anger and impulse control, and increased mental health services).
Establish equivalent policies governing transfer to, release from, and privileges for disciplinary segregation inmates at the MCF and at the SHU.
3. Improve Physical Conditions
The Indiana legislature should:
Provide sufficient resources to the Indiana DOC to finance the modification of the physical plant at MCF and the SHU to eliminate egregiously harsh and harmful conditions.
The Indiana Department of Corrections should:
Renovate the MCF and the SHU to create genuine outdoor recreation areas in which inmates are exposed to sunlight and can see outside of the facility, and indoor or outdoor recreation areas large enough to allow inmates to run at a reasonably high speed and to exercise with another person comfortably.
Construct sufficient windows in cells at the SHU so that no prisoner is confined in a windowless cell for more than a brief period.
Replace the solid steel cell doors in use at the MCF with doors, such as those in use at the SHU, that allow prisoners greater opportunities for social interaction.
4. Eliminate Unnecessarily Harsh and Counterproductive Practices
The Indiana Department of Corrections should:
Establish a program of increased privileges, including enhanced access to congregate activities and educational and vocational activities, to reward and encourage infraction-free and responsible behavior by inmates confined in administrative and disciplinary segregation.
Encourage increased contact between inmates and their families and communities. The department should end the routine shackling of all inmates during visits and consider permitting selected inmates to have contact visits with their families. It should increase access of inmates at the SHU to telephones.
Discontinue its practice of releasing inmates into society directly from segregated confinement. Prior to release from the MCF or SHU, all inmates should be provided effective transition programming to facilitate social readjustment.
Reduce racial tensions in the MCF and the SHU by, among other things, undertaking aggressive efforts to recruit and train African Americans as correctional staff, providing increased racial sensitivity training to staff, and emphasizing to staff through the use of internal disciplinary mechanisms that racial harassment and discrimination will not be tolerated.
Enhance monitoring and supervision of correctional staff and utilize disciplinary mechanisms to prevent and punish the inappropriate, unnecessary, or excessive use of physical force.
The Indiana legislature should:
Instruct the Indiana DOC to review conditions and practices at the MCF and the SHU to identify measures needed to better promote the rehabilitation of inmates and their ability to lead law-abiding lives upon release. The review should be undertaken with the participation of outside professionals with correctional, mental health and other relevant experience and with input from inmates and should result in a public report that includes findings and suggested reforms.
5. Monitor Conditions at the MCF and the SHU
The Indiana legislature should:
Create a permanent independent ombudsman with the authority and adequate staff to: monitorconditions in the MCF and the SHU; report its findings to the Indiana DOC, the legislature, and the public; and make recommendations for reform.
Create a permanent independent review committee composed of qualified mental health professionals who are not employed by the Indiana DOC to monitor mental health care in the Indiana prison system.
posted by Bob Cardwell @ 7:19 AM
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