Solitary Confinement Is The Process Of Isolating Individuals Incarcerated From The General Population

Many researchers have found that long periods of time in solitary confinement can have negative mental effects on inmates. This is due to long-term confinement because it consists of not only prolonged deprivation of social interaction but also sensory deprivation (Haney, 2003). Medical ethics are also in question about the effects of long term confinement. Medical professionals have to handle a particularly difficult situation because they are required to provide medical assistance to these inmates that may be facing psychological issues. This is a problem because medical professionals are aware that solitary confinement has negative effects on the well-being and mental state of these individuals (Shalev, 2011).

There have been various studies conducted over the past few decades that show the devastating consequences of the use of solitary confinement in prisons. Studies show that the method of solitary confinement has the potential to lead to severe psychological effects on prison inmates. To address the consequences of solitary confinement in the U.S. federal prison system, President Obama directed Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch as well as the Justice Department to review and analyze the overuse of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons. Six months later, on January 25th, 2016, President Obama officially announced that he is adapting the recommendations proposed by the Attorney General and the Justice Department to reform the federal prison system.

Solitary confinement has had a long history in the American prison system. America is the first country to adapt solitary confinement into the prison regiment. Pennsylvania had the first special housing units for inmates or “SHU”. When Europeans came to America to look at the new model for prisons in Pennsylvania they wrote reports describing to the European parliament on how prisoners were treated like caged animals. Many of them quickly realized that this was not what prisons were set out to accomplish. The purpose of a prison is to rehabilitate criminals and bring them back into society as an individual that has the best mental tools and skills to make their respective communities better. Putting inmates in solitary confinement for more than 48 hours can only lead to awful emotional pain and mental problems which can result in self-destructive behavior to regain the self-control that is being deprived through this process of isolation and expulsion.

Solitary confinement does affect those inmates who have been diagnosed as mentally ill prior to entering solitary confinement differently than those who have never been diagnosed as mentally ill.

Solitary confinement is occasionally used in most prison systems as a means to maintain prison order. Mainly for disciplinary punishment, or as a place to put inmates that are at escape risk, or a risk to themselves and prison order. Sometimes inmates that are sex offenders voluntarily choose solitary as a means of protection from other prisoners. Sometimes solitary can be used to hold pretrial detainees to prevent them from messing with witness, so they can’t try and force a confession. For 23 hours a day inmates are confined to the barren environment that is their cell with high surveillance (Smith, Peter Scharff, 2006.) Inmates have no social contact. Visits and phone calls are infrequent and highly restricted. Visits sometime only take place via video screens. The physical contact one experiences is limited to the interaction with prison guards, weather it be putting on restraints or taking them off.

According to “Solitary Confinement: Common Misconceptions and Emerging Safe Alternatives” by Alison Shames, Jessa Wilcox, and Ram Subramanian on the Vera Institute of Justice, solitary confinement is often sentenced to “fulfill a prison’s or jail’s top priority: the safety of its staff and the incarcerated people under their care.” (Shames, Wilcox, & Subramanian, 2015). However, most inmates that are placed in solitary confinement are

Solitary confinement in the prison system is far too common in this country. Bohm and Haley (2017) note that 15 consecutive days spent in solitary confinement is considered to be cruel and/or torturesome as reported by a UN Special Rapporteur. These 15 days are also the point at which psychological damage occurs and is also irreversible. So if 15 days has been identified as cruelty and likely irreversible to one’s mental stability, then why do prison systems continue to place inmates in solitary confinement for

Over the last couple of decades, prison systems have adopted the use of solitary confinement as a means of punishment and have progressively depended on it to help maintain obedience and discipline inside the prison structure. Solitary confinement is a form of incarceration in which a prisoner is isolated in a cell for multiple hours, days, or weeks with limited to no human contact. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, the United States represents only 5% of the world's population yet houses 20% of the world’s prisoners (ACLU). Two of the biggest problems with our modern day criminal justice system is the overwhelming number of people that are incarcerated in the United States and the overwhelming number of convicts who return

While solitary confinement is one of the most effective ways of keeping todays prisoners from conflict and communication, it is also the most detrimental to their health. According to NPR the reason for most solitary confinement units in America “is to control the prison gangs (NPR, 2011).” But that is not always the case. Sometimes putting a gang member in solitary reduces the shock and awe effect that it is supposed to have, when they start losing their minds. The prisoners kept in solitary confinement show more psychotic symptoms than that of a normal prisoner, including a higher suicide rate. Once a prisoner’s mental capacity to understand why he is in prison and why he is being punished is gone, there is no reason to keep said

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, Solitary Confinement is the confinement of a prisoner in a cell or other place which he or she is completely isolated from any and everyone. Merriam Webster also states that even some prisoners are held from 22.5 to 24 hours a day. Solitary confinement is sometimes referred to as isolation, segregation, separation, and cellular confinements so that it seems different from solitary confinement or too make it sound like a less harsh punishment. Solitary Confinement is a huge controversy in today’s society, although some might of forgot due to the fact that there’s an orange oompa loompa celebrity as our president, but this has been a problem since it was introduced in 1829. “In 1829, the first experiment in solitary confinement was at the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia. It was based on a Quaker belief that prisoners isolated in stone cells with only a Bible would use the time to repent, pray and find introspection.”(Timeline on NPR.org) A large population of people believe that solitary confinement is a violation against anyone 's human rights. On the other side of this argument, some people believe it is a necessary form of punishment and that it does not violate anyone’s human or constitutional rights. In my personal opinion, Solitary confinement violates both the 8th Amendment of the United States Constitution and Article five of the Declaration of Human Rights. I don’t understand how isolating someone for that

Author Amy Bennett has recently noticed the increasing media presence on solitary confinement and the abuses found in the U.S. prison system. She noticed that states have been rethinking the practice of solitary confinement with the most notable one being New York and the investigation of Rikers Island. She talked about solitary confinement and how it relates to torture. “Despite the reforms underway at Rikers, there are still those over 18 years of age who will experience the torture of solitary confinement, many of them mentally ill. Still others will become mentally ill as a result of solitary confinement.”(Bennett, 2016) She is saying that isolation can cause one to become mentally ill even though it is under reform.

Solitary Confinement can actually cause mental health issues. People can literally go insane because of no interaction with people and being in isolation all the time. Some people get so bad that they have to be take and put in a straight jacket in a padded room. For 23 hours a day inmates are kept in a room a little smaller than a horse stable, and the only time they have to get out is when it’s time for them to be outside. Some prisons don’t even do that. All they do is give them food through a little whole in the door. (Front

Since the early 1800s, the United States has relied on a method of punishment barely known to any other country, solitary confinement (Cole). Despite this method once being thought of as the breakthrough in the prison system, history has proved differently. Solitary confinement was once used in a short period of time to fix a prisoners behavior, but is now used as a long term method that shows to prove absolutely nothing. Spending 22-24 hours a day in a small room containing practically nothing has proved to fix nothing in a person except further insanity. One cannot rid himself of insanity in a room that causes them to go insane. Solitary confinement is a flawed and unnecessary method of punishment that should be prohibited in the prison

However, the use of it needs to be lowered significantly. " In the United States there have been several legal challenges to the use of solitary confinement, based on allegations that it may have serious psychiatric consequences." (Bureau of Justice Statistics Reentry Trends in the U.S.: Recidivism. 1994, https://www.bjs.gov/content/reentry/recidivism.cfm. Accessed 20 Jan. 2017. (Bureau of Justice Statistics Reentry Trends in the U.S.: Recidivism)

Not too many people know what Solitary confinement is or what it can do to a human being. Solitary confinement is a special form of imprisonment. The prisoner is confined in a small windowless unit completely isolated from any human contact. It is a form of punishment for behavior modification beyond incarceration for a prisoner and is used as an additional measure of protection from the inmate.