Lawsuit Filed Against Solitary Confinement of 800 Mentally Ill In Pennsylvania

Lawsuit Filed Against Solitary Confinement of 800 Seriously Mentally Ill In Pennsylvania by Sal Rodriguez RHU cell of prisoner Matthew Bullock, who committed suicide in 2009. The Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania (DRNP) has filed a lawsuit against John Wetzel, the Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, charging that the confinement of prisoners in Restricted Housing Units (RHUs) amounts to cruel and unusual punishment of those diagnosed as seriously mentally ill. The suit seeks an end to long-term segregation of such individuals and seeks an order that DOC prisoners receive constitutionally adequate mental health care. According to the lawsuit, prisoners in the RHUs are locked in extremely small cells for at least 23 hours a day on weekdays and 24 hours a day on weekends and holidays. Typically, the lights are on in the cell all the time. The prisoners are denied adequate mental health care and prohibited from working, participating in educational or rehabilitative programs, or attending religious services. Prisoners in the RHU are generally held alone, notes the lawsuit, though even in cases when prisoners are assigned a cellmate, this may be "as deleterious to their mental health as solitary confinement" if the cellmate is "psychotic or violent." Placing people in such conditions, can create a Dickensian nightmare, in which prisoners are trapped in an endless cycle of isolation and punishment, further deterioration of their mental illness, deprivation of adequate mental health treatment, and inability to qualify for parole. The lawsuit provides profiles of 12 men housed in the RHU, which serve to illustrate the widespread use of solitary confinement against prisoners who have been diagnosed as having "serious mental illnesses." A man identified as "Prisoner #1" is described in the lawsuit as having been diagnosed with a delusional disorder with paranoid features and a borderline intellectual diability. Initially placed in a Special Needs Unit, in which prisoners receive psychiatric treatment, he was frequently placed in the RHU following incidents precipitated by delusions. Despite expressing suicidal thoughts before and during his confinement in the RHU, he remained in the RHU until he committed suicide by hanging on May 6, 2011. Prisoner #8 is a 28-year old man at State Correctional Institution-Green (SCI-Green) who has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, a psychotic disorder, a paraphilia, and a personality disorder. According to the lawsuit, he claims to receive "messages from the television and from dead people." The lawsuit states that he has expressed suicidal ideation and has been placed in the RHU after being deemed by the Department of Corrections a "danger to himself and others. The lawsuit charges that Wetzel knows or is deliberately indifferent to the fact that the DOC's treatment of prisoners with mental illness, including the practice of segregating them for long periods of time in RHUs, can cause grave harm to their mental health. While it is unclear what DSM-Axis I mental disorders fall under the scope of serious mental illness, the lawsuit argues that the current disciplinary system within Pennsylvania prisons fails to "consider a prisoner's serious mental illness and the impact of isolation in assessing whether to sanction the prisoners. Pennsylvania prisoner Ricardo Noble, who has spent over five years in the RHU, has written to Solitary Watch about the nature of life in the isolation units: In the RHU life is intense. Especially in the beginning weeks or months. As time passes your mind begins to become clouded with mixed emotions, anger, guilt, hate, paranoia, hopelessness, loneliness, and other frustrations. Some who fail to productively channel their frustrations tend to take it out on those closest to them (mainly other prisoners) or even themselves because they can’t lash out on the ones (the Administration) who can affect change of the physical aspects of their harsh condition. Approximately 1/3 of prisoners in the RHUs, which as of February 28th housed 844 prisoners in long term Administrative Custody and an additional 1,417 in shorter term Disciplinary Custody, have been described by DRNP as seriously mentally ill.The DRNP cited the position of the American Psychiatric Association, which in December 2012 declared that prolonged segregation of adult inmates with serious mental illness, with rare exceptions should be avoided due to the potential harm to such inmates. For more on solitary confinement in Pennsylvania, click here to read Solitary Watch's reporting. http://solitarywatch.com/2013/03/18/lawsuit-filed-against-solitary-confinement-of-800-seriously-mentally-ill-in-pennsylvania/

Nine state prison guards charged in inmate beating probe

MD - Nine state prison guards charged in inmate beating probe Nine state prison guards charged in inmate beating probe Federal indictment alleges officers at Hagerstown prison planned assault, covered it up By Carrie Wells, The Baltimore Sun 10:38 p.m. EST, February 27, 2013 Nine current and former guards at a state prison in Hagerstown were charged Wednesday in a federal indictment that alleges they conspired to assault an inmate and covered up the incident. The U.S. Department of Justice indictment refers to two separate beatings of an inmate, identified only as "K.D.," in the same weekend in March 2008. K.D. was beaten so badly that he had to be taken to a hospital, the indictment says. None of the current and former prison officers was actually charged with assault. The charges included obstruction of justice for one lieutenant at the prison who the justice department says used a magnetic device to destroy surveillance tapes that captured the beating. The beatings of the inmate at medium-security Roxbury Correctional Institution in 2008, coming at the same time as an alleged inmate beating at maximum-security North Branch Correctional Institute in Cumberland, led to a high-profile investigation and scrutiny of the state prison system that year. Two dozen officers at both prisons were fired or put on leave amid the investigation, though two guards were later reinstated. The Department of Justice says K.D. was assaulted first during the 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift at Roxbury on March 8, 2008. In one indictment, Correctional Officer Walter Steele and Lieutenant Jason Weicht face conspiracy charges related to covering up the assault. Former Correctional Officers James Kalbflesh and Jeremy McCusker face civil rights and conspiracy charges. Weicht was also charged with obstruction of justice. The justice department said his actions included "encouraging officers to get together to get their stories straight, providing home telephone numbers for the involved officers so that they could arrange for a cover-up meeting, and giving an officer books on interrogation techniques so that he would be prepared to mislead investigators." Steele faces two more counts of providing false and misleading information to investigators. A second federal indictment stems from a second assault on K.D. the following morning, during the 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. shift. It was after that beating, in which K.D. was kicked and punched in his cell "in order to punish K.D. for a prior incident involving another officer" that the inmate was sent to the hospital, according to the Department of Justice. Lt. Edwin Stigile and former Correctional Officers Tyson Hinckle, Reginald Martin and Michael Morgan were charged with conspiring to have officers assault K.D. during the day shift. Sgt. Josh Hummer and Hinckle, Martin and Morgan also were each charged with a civil rights violation, and Stigile was charged with obstruction of justice for allegedly destroying surveillance tapes that recorded the beating. The maximum sentences for the prison officers range from 25 years to 55 years. Dustin Norris, a former correctional officer at Roxbury, pleaded guilty to conspiring to assault the inmate and faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison, the justice department also announced Wednesday. cwells@baltsun.com twitter.com/cwellssun http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/crime/blog/bs-md-prison-guards-conspiracy-20130227,0,6505284.story#sthash.ZD4dYQnR.dpuf