Who is Biased Against Prison and Sentencing Reform?

Obama Bans Solitary Confinement for Juveniles in Federal Prisons

by

Juliet Eilperin of The Washington Post

Available @ http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/obama-bans-solitary-confinement-for-juveniles-in-federal-prisons/ar-BBoGRXH?ocid=spartandhp

President Obama on Monday announced a ban on solitary confinement for juvenile offenders in the federal prison system, saying the practice is overused and has the potential for devastating psychological consequences.

In an op-ed that appears in Tuesday editions of The Washington Post, the president outlines a series of executive actions that also prohibit federal corrections officials from punishing prisoners who commit “low-level infractions” with solitary confinement. The new rules also call for expanding treatment for mentally ill prisoners.

The president’s reforms are expected to affect about 10,000 inmates.

The reforms come six months after Obama, as part of a broader criminal-justice reform push, ordered the Justice Department to study how solitary confinement was being used by the federal Bureau of Prisons.

The move is another example of the extent to which the nation’s first African American president now seems willing to tackle delicate questions of race and criminal justice as he closes out his presidency. Obama has also been focused on trying to put in place programs to help ex-offenders reintegrate into society once they have left prison.

“How can we subject prisoners to unnecessary solitary confinement, knowing its effects, and then expect them to return to our communities as whole people?” the president wrote in his op-ed. “It doesn’t make us safer. It’s an affront to our common humanity.”

He said he hoped his reforms at the federal level will serve as a model for states to rethink their rules on the issue.

At least a dozen states have taken steps in the past two years to curtail the use of solitary confinement, either in response to lawsuits or through legislative and administrative changes. An increasing number of studies show a connection between isolating prisoners and higher rates of recidivism.

In recent weeks, Illinois and Oregon, in response to lawsuits, have announced they will exclude seriously mentally ill inmates from solitary confinement, and last month New York state reached a five-year, $62 million settlement with the New York Civil Liberties Union in which it pledged to significantly cut the number of prisoners in solitary as well as the maximum time they could stay there. California reached a settlement in September, pledging to overhaul the way it treats almost 3,000 inmates who are frequently kept alone for more than 22 hours a day in their cells.

Amy Fettig, senior staff counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union and director of the group’s Stop Solitary Campaign, said in an interview that the Bureau of Prisons “has lagged behind a number of the states in reforming solitary confinement and in restricting its use and abuse.”

“It’s absolutely huge,” Fettig said of Obama’s decision to change the way the federal system isolated inmates. “We rarely have presidents take notice of prison conditions.”

While Obama is leaving the details of policy implementation to agency officials, the Justice Department's report includes “50 guiding principles” that all federal correctional facilities must now follow. They include increasing the amount of time inmates placed in solitary can spend outside of their cells, housing prisoners in the “least restrictive setting necessary” to ensure their safety and those of others, putting inmates who need to be in protective custody in less-restrictive settings, and developing policies to discourage putting inmates in solitary during the last 180 days of their terms.

A congressionally mandated audit of restrictive housing in federal prisons, published last year by the Center for Naval Analyses, found that roughly 60 percent of the inmates whose solitary cases were reviewed had serious underdiagnosed or untreated mental illnesses. That study also found that many individuals put in protective custody for their own safety, including lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender prisoners and those who are disabled, were regularly placed in solitary confinement.

Some of the states that championed reforms early, including Washington state, have found that prisoners placed in restrictive housing — especially just before their release — are more likely to be repeat offenders. One study found that Washington state prisoners who were confined in solitary had a 20 to 25 percent higher recidivism rate than those in less-restrictive housing, and that those who spent time in solitary directly before reentering society were more likely to commit violent crimes.

Inimai M. Chettiar, who directs the Justice Program at New York University Law School’s Brennan Center for Justice, said in an interview that many Americans historically have not been focused on how inmates are punished or treated once they’re in jail.

“People think, ‘Okay, that’s prisoners, who cares?’ ” she said. “In recent years it has come to light that not only is solitary confinement not good for prisoners, but it has really negative effects on both recidivism and the crime rate.”

Kevin Ring, vice president of Fam­il­ies Against Man­dat­ory Min­im­ums, served 15 months in federal prison on fraud charges in connection with a scandal surrounding Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff. He spent two days in solitary in October because of a scabies outbreak in a Cumberland, Md., facility. Although the isolation was not designed to punish the inmates, Ring said guards took away all his possessions — including paper and pen — and put in a small cell with just a metal bed, shower and small window. The lack of human contact was the most disorienting part, he said, since guards pushed a tray of food through a slot at assigned meal times and he could “only hear voices down the hall” for the entire period.

“I don’t know how people do it. I’m not solitary material,” Ring said, adding that it should be used only “as a last resort.”

As many as 100,000 state and federal prisoners are held in solitary confinement in the United States at any given time, according to the White House, and several states have taken steps recently to curtail its practice.

The president begin his op-ed by recounting the story of 16-year-old Bronx resident Kalief Browder, who was sent to Rikers Island in 2010 to await trail after stealing a backpack. He “spent nearly two years in solitary ­confinement,” Obama wrote. Browder was released in 2013 but committed suicide at 22.

“Today, it’s increasingly overused on people like Kalief, with heartbreaking results — which is why my administration is taking steps to address this problem,” Obama wrote. “In America, we believe in redemption.”

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Commentary by John Dewar Gleissner, Esquire

I have to agree with President Obama's actions concerning solitary confinement, and note he is following several states, which is something we federalists like.  These are reasonable and humane steps to take if incarceration is still the method of punishment. Lack of solitary confinement will make prisons and jails more difficult to control, but confinement can be handled without it, especially with regard to juveniles. The goal is to reduce recidivism.  Separate but adjoining cells, separated only by prison bars or barriers, but allowing conversation, is one way to do it. 

But the underlying structural problems of incarceration remain:

1.  The Rikers Island Jail referred to above costs New York City about $160,000 per year per prisoner. Almost two years of Kalief Browder's torture cost the City of New York over about $250,000.  For what?  For whom? 

2.  Suicide rates for prisoners are higher than the national average whether they are placed in solitary confinement or the general prison or jail population.

3.  It takes a long time for some jail inmates to reach a trial, plea deal or case disposition.

4.  Offenses still carry a punishment of incarceration, and incarceration in the meantime is the fate of folks who cannot or will not make bail.

5.  Prisons and jails must administer punishment to maintain discipline and safety in confinement, and this punishment, however administered, controls the jail/prison behavior of the inmate, not the crime for which the prisoner is confined in jail or prison. There is a disconnect between the crime and the effective or real punishment inflicted.

If you are familiar with this blog, you know what traditional, proven, Bible-based, cost-efficient practical steps can be taken to shrink the incarceration paradigm and give many inmates a preferred route out of their confinement by accepting responsibility.  Thinking outside the box is necessary, and unfortunately, few are willing to escape the all-powerful mindset of incarceration as the only thing we know. Change is slow, particularly with prison systems and methods of punishment.  Experiments like incarceration itself, mandatory sentences, three-strikes laws and war against illegal drugs take decades or centuries to run their course. 

I do not have a dog in this fight!  What motivates me are (1) the stupidity of what we are doing now, (2) the intransigence of most, and (3) the desire to make the legal system and therefore the United States of American better, more efficient, wealthier and happier.

Deuteronomy 25:1-3