Seven Days in Solitary [6/16/13]
by Lisa Dawson
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.
• According to the tally kept by The Miami Herald, 104 of the 166 men held captive at Guantanamo are now on hunger strike, with 44 being force-fed and two hospitalized. The Miami Herald also reports that
the House of Representatives, disregarding a White House veto
threat, has passed a $638 billion defense bill that would block
President Barack Obama from closing the military prison.
• PBS Frontline reports on the abusive use of solitary confinement in the United States, citing the recent critical findings of two separate investigations by the DOJ (covered by Solitary Watch here) and the GAO (covered by Solitary Watch here), noting that both reports "mark an 'historic' level of scrutiny of the use of isolation."
• Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity reports that
California's new solitary confinement policy is a "human rights
disaster," stating that "the new program keeps most of the objectionable
elements of the old program and adds some new elements which make it
even worse."
• Cell-Out Arizona reports
on AFSC Arizona's response to a statement made by Charles Ryan, Arizona
DOC Director, claiming that solitary confinement doesn't exist in
Arizona prisons. The story states that "this claim demonstrates either a
misunderstanding or deliberate obfuscation on Director Ryan’s part of
what constitutes solitary confinement."
• Cell-Out Arizona reports
on racial disparities and prejudice in Arizona supermax prisons,
stating that "not only are people of color more likely to end up in
prison, but once in an Arizona prison the chances of ending up in
long-term isolation are also higher!"
• BBC News reports
on steps that people held in solitary confinement can take to
mitigate the potentially psychologically devastating effects of
isolation, concluding with the words of a man who who experienced
solitary firsthand: "And smile and be happy - and don't be afraid of
anybody."
• Huffington Post Live discusses
the recent exposures of inhumane conditions in prisons around the
country with noted criminal justice and prison reform advocates,
including Lois Ahrens of the Real Cost of Prisons Project and Peter
Wagner of Prison Policy Initiative.
• San Francisco Bay View reports
that, with weeks before statewide hunger strikes are set to resume, the
CDCR has implemented a new policy at Pelican Bay State Prison which
requires guards to conduct "welfare checks" on people held in SHU every
30 minutes, resulting in "chronic sleep deprivation for prisoners in
solitary confinement."
• ArchDaily reports on Roman Mars' recent discussion
on the ethics of architects taking on jobs that call for the design of
prisons to hold people in solitary confinement or that contain execution
chambers. Solitary Watch covers the “Alternatives to Incarceration / Prison Design Boycott Campaign” in a guest post by Raphael Sperry.
• CounterPunch reports
on "judicial ignorance and bias" in the case of Ahmed Abu Ali,
currently held in government-imposed Special Administrative Measures
(SAMs) at ADX, the notorious federal supermax in Colorado.
• The Associated Press reports
that advocacy group The Promise of Justice Initiative has filed a
federal lawsuit on behalf of three people held on death row at the
Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, stating that the men "are forced
to live in poorly-ventilated cells that lack air conditioning, and
average temperatures exceed 95 degrees during the summer."
• The Atlantic reports
on the recent revelations on "the systemic abuse and neglect of
inmates, and especially mentally ill inmates" in prisons around the
country, concluding that "in our zeal to dehumanize criminals we have
allowed our prisons to become medieval places of unspeakable cruelty so
far beyond constitutional norms that they are barely recognizable."
Thanks for blogging this.
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