WDC plans to support one piece of legislation in the upcoming legislative session that would significantly constrain the use of solitary confinement in Maryland prisons. This brief article will discuss why the legislation is necessary.
The United Nations describes solitary confinement as torture. No one considering what solitary confinement involves could think of it as less. Solitary confinement, or restrictive housing as it is called in Maryland, includes isolating a person in a cell for weeks, months and often years—often for many years. The impact of days in solitary can be devastating to mental and physical health; people locked up in this way suffer depression, and anxiety. Those in solitary are far more likely to mutilate themselves or commit or attempt suicide. Solitary confinement destroys people: it has been described as permanently damaging the mind, body and soul of those who experience it.
The UN included strict limits on the use of solitary in its revised Minimum Standards for the Treatment of Prisoners, known as the Nelson Mandela Rules. The standards demand that, at a minimum, all nations restrict their use of solitary to no more than 15 days, and ban it altogether for children, pregnant people and new mothers, individuals with mental illness and physical disabilities, and other vulnerable populations. New York recently passed legislation, known as the HALT Act, which comes close to meeting this floor, though implementation is proving to be challenging. Maryland will have the chance to do something similar to HALT in the upcoming session.
[To learn more about the UN standard on solitary, the HALT Act, solitary confinement across the country, what solitary looks and feels like, and more on the impact on those who experience it, go to Unlock the Box.]
Maryland prisons are known for bad food, filth, fledgling rehabilitative services, and inane, nerve-bracing rules. So, you would expect that someone in this environment who is then sent to solitary confinement must have done something terrible to deserve the decidedly worse treatment. This is not so. People are placed in solitary for running afoul administrative rules, for mental health issues, for protection as a youth, or because of sexual orientation—things that have nothing to do with violent acts that might arguably justify such an extreme and damaging response.
Maryland had not shared information on its practices regarding solitary confinement so it had been difficult to determine the extent of the problem. In 2016, legislation passed requiring annual reporting on who was isolated and for how long. But, the last substantive report was for fiscal year 2018. It revealed that 50% of those in prison are placed in solitary, and the average length of confinement is anywhere from 43 to 51 days. For more details, look here.
Marylanders are responsible for what happens to those we place in prisons. We need to focus our attention on how destructive the prison experience is, and how to assure that those in prison can return to the community less broken. An obvious starting place is to demand that the resort to torture is understood as extreme and rarely, if ever, used.