ANNAPOLIS, MD - Today, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Maryland joined allies in heralding passage in both chambers of the General Assembly of legislation to require the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services to report annually on the use of solitary confinement, or "restrictive housing" (SB 946/HB1180).
In 2010, a study showed that Maryland places 8 percent of inmates in restrictive housing, twice the national average of 4-5 percent. In 2015, the state revealed in a letter to a legislator that Maryland's use of restrictive housing remained at about 8 percent. The average length of stay in "segregation" is between 124-130 days. Mentally ill inmates fare even worse, according to the state's letter. They are placed in restrictive housing at a rate of 15.5 percent (twice that of the general population), and spend about 224-228 days in segregation. According to the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, the mentally ill should never be placed in isolation.
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6 comments:
The UN should be focusing on member nations with worse human rights violations than MD's rate of solitary confinement.
Segregated housing is often requested by inmates who have fear of injury by others. ECI's segregated population are housed in what amounts to a normal cell, surrounded by other normal cells, but with only one inmate instead of two in each.
Work at ECI for one month and you will understand why some inmates (convicts) are housed alone. They have assaulted or killed previous cell mates and let it be known they will kill the next one who tries to share the cell. Some inmates are territorial about their cells and refuse to share at all costs.
Would you be willing to accept the responsibility of someone being murdered if you had knowledge they would be in danger?
When Pres. Jimmy Carter ordered mental institutions for long term patients to be closed there was little option but end up in prison. Ask any person who works in a prison and they will tell you that a large portion of those housed there need to be housed in a mental institution where they can receive care that is not available in a prison.
Anonymous Anonymous said...
The UN should be focusing on member nations with worse human rights violations than MD's rate of solitary confinement.
April 7, 2016 at 1:22 AM
Why? Shouldn't the great USA be leading with an explementary example? How can we accuse other nations of human rights abuses when we commit them ourselves? WE love to point the finger at others but we think our crap don't stink. We have enough to do to straighten out our own backyard without sticking our noses in other people's business.
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Segregated housing is often requested by inmates who have fear of injury by others. ECI's segregated population are housed in what amounts to a normal cell, surrounded by other normal cells, but with only one inmate instead of two in each.
April 7, 2016 at 7:31 AM
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Work at ECI for one month and you will understand why some inmates (convicts) are housed alone. They have assaulted or killed previous cell mates and let it be known they will kill the next one who tries to share the cell. Some inmates are territorial about their cells and refuse to share at all costs.
Would you be willing to accept the responsibility of someone being murdered if you had knowledge they would be in danger?
April 7, 2016 at 2:04 PM
I assume by your statements that you work at ECI, but it seems you don't understand what solitary confinement means in this instance. While it may be that being alone in a cell is 'solitary', (being the only person in a cell) 'solitary confinement' is being defined as isolated, limited to no human contact, no outside contact etc.
Like being placed in 'the hole'.
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