End Solitary Confinement
of People with Psychiatric Disabilities!

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PRESS HIGHLIGHTS
FROM THE STRUGGLE TO PASS THE SHU BILL

New York Advocates Urge Governor to Support SHU Legislation
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BOOK EXPOSES NEGLECT AND INJUSTICE
Mary Beth Pfeiffer has published her groundbreaking exposé, Crazy in American: The Hidden Tragedy of Our Criminalized Mentally Ill. In this deeply sensitive and rigorously documented work, Pfeiffer, an award-winning journalist, uncovers the real truth of what happens to people with psychiatric disabilities in our society when they cannot receive the care they need to keep themselves safe. As we read, their journey frequently leads to the criminal justice system, which is fundamentally unprepared to assist them. All too often, the result is abuse, severe self-injury, and death. Read more.

Legislature Agrees To Take Mentally Ill Prisoners
Out Of Solitary Confinement

By Michael Gormley

Associated Press 

January 15, 2008 

Seriously mentally ill prisoners will be taken out of solitary confinement in prison cells and placed in secure treatment facilities under a bill that gained final legislative approval Tuesday.

The Senate and Assembly passed the bill that ends a long effort by advocates for the prisoners to first get seriously mentally ill patients out of 24-hour, solitary confinement and then to get them in treatment-based, secure facilities.

The measure also requires the state to conduct mental health assessments of all prisoners in segregated or special housing units known as SHUs. They could then be placed in secure facilities run by the state Office of Mental Health and the Department of Correctional Services, which runs the state's prisons. Prisoners who remain in solitary confinement would have to receive periodic assessments.

"This caps a four-year campaign to see New York become the national leader in providing mental health alternatives to those in solitary confinement," said Harvey Rosenthal, executive director of the New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services.

"It will get them out of solitary and put them in appropriate mental health settings," he said. "You're treated like someone who needs help, not a bad actor."

Gov. Eliot Spitzer will now consider the bill. He has supported getting seriously mentally ill prisoners into secure treatment.

"This legislation improves the way the state of New York treats inmates who are afflicted with serious mental illnesses," said Corrections Committee Chairman Jeffrion Aubry, a Queens Democrat. "It advances treatment over punishment and better prepares correction officers who interact with such inmates, thereby enhancing safety of not only inmates and staff but of the public, as well."

New York has had more prisoners in segregated units for disciplinary purposes than any state. Almost a quarter of the prisoners in the segregated housing in New York had a history of mental illness and advocates for the mentally illl said solitary confinement can lead to more suicides and poorer mental health.

The measures also provides more mental health training for corrections officers and prison staff. The Commission on Quality Care and Advocacy for People with Disabilities will monitor mental health programs in state prisons.

Last year, the Spitzer administration acted to provide better treatment of mentally ill prisoners, ending 23-hour-a-day solitary confinement and limiting the use of a bread-and-cabbage diet and other punishments. Disability Advocates had sued the previous Pataki administration in federal court in 2002, claiming the state failed to provide treatment the prisoners needed and that solitary confinement led to severe psychiatric deterioration, self-mutilation and suicide. 

Spitzer decided mentally ill prisoners in the special units would get at least two hours of treatment outside of their solitary confinement cells each day and as many as four hours additional recreation time.

Lawmakers OK Ban On Solitary For Mentally Ill Prisoners

by Jay Gallagher and Cara Matthews

Poughkeepsie Journal

January 15, 2008

ALBANY — The state Legislature Tuesday passed a bill that would prohibit solitary confinement for severely mentally ill state-prison inmates in most cases. Gov. Eliot Spitzer has said he supports the plan.

“This landmark legislation will improve safety conditions for both mentally disabled prisoners and correctional officers alike,” said Jack Beck of the Prison Visiting Project at the Correctional Association of New York.

The measure passed 55-0 in the Senate and 134-3 in the Assembly. It now goes to Spitzer, who is expected to sign it into law.

There was a deal to approve the measure last year, but final passage was delayed until Tuesday because the Assembly never returned to the Capitol after the regular legislative session adjourned last June.

“It is a win-win measure that will also save taxpayers by reducing unnecessarily extended prison sentences, avoidable prison inpatient mental health care stays and reduced injuries to correctional personnel,” said Robert Corliss of the Mental Health Association of New York State.

The measure would require the state Department of Correctional Services to set up residential-treatment units for inmates with serious psychiatric illnesses.

The inmates would get at least four hours of therapeutic programming and/or treatment out of their cell a day, five days a week. The original legislation would have banned solitary confinement for those with mental illness.

Such confinement in a 6-foot by 9-foot cell and lack of treatment worsen psychiatric conditions and punish inmates for behaviors connected with their illnesses, critics say.

“The Assembly is mindful of the detrimental effects of segregated housing units on inmates suffering from acute mental illness,” said Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan. “This bill is a better alternative to the current practice and will help to create a safer environment for both inmates and staff in our state facilities.”

Serious mental illness affects about 12 percent of the prison population in the state, or some 8,000 inmates, according to the bill’s sponsors.

Many of the changes required by the bill wouldn’t take effect for two years from when the first residential mental-health unit built by the prison system was completed, but no later than July 1, 2011.

This year’s budget includes more than $50 million for construction and $2 million each to the state Office of Mental Health and the Department of Correctional Services for staffing.

Next year’s budget will include $12 million more, with $19 million added the following year and $29 million in 2010-11 to implement the program, Spitzer spokesman Matt Anderson said.

New York Ends Solitary Confinement
of Mentally-Ill Prisoners

Democracy Now

(hosted by Amy Goodman; airs on Pacifica, WBAI, in New York and also airs on radio and television stations across the country)

January 16, 2008 

And here in New York, state lawmakers have approved a bill that would bar holding seriously mentally-ill prisoners in solitary confinement. Under the measure, the prisoners will now be transferred to secure treatment facilities rather than kept in twenty-four-hour solitude. The measure caps a four-year campaign by mental health and prisoner advocates. They’ve argued that solitary confinement of mentally-ill prisoners is inhumane and has led to increased suicides and declining mental health.

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/16/headlines

Bill Limits Solitary Confinement

By Rick Karlin, Capitol bureau

Albany Times-Union

January 16, 2008

Spitzer expected to approve measure passed by Legislature removing mentally ill inmates from isolation

ALBANY -- Lawmakers passed a long-debated measure Tuesday to remove mentally ill prison inmates from solitary confinement and at least one of the prime sponsors says he's confident Gov. Eliot Spitzer will sign it after negotiators resolved some lingering issues.

The measure passed on Tuesday would require that most inmates with serious mental illnesses be placed in treatment units rather than kept in Special Housing Units, or SHUs. Additionally, the Department of Correctional Services would have to conduct periodic mental health assessments of any inmates who are assigned to SHUs.

The bill's sponsors estimate 12 percent of the state's prison population, about 8,000 inmates, have serious mental illness.

The Senate passed a similar bill last year, but the legislation died in the Assembly after Spitzer expressed concerns about the measure as it was written and time ran out on negotiations.

This year's bill, however, is the result of negotiations that address the governor's concerns, said Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry, D-Queens, who has pushed for the measure along with Sen. Michael Nozzolio, R-Seneca Falls.

The compromises include a clause that allows use of a SHU if an inmate presents an "overarching security concern," Aubry said.

Spitzer spokeswoman Christine Anderson declined comment on the governor's plans, but Aubry said he was confident Spitzer will sign the measure.

Many elements of the bill would not take effect until two years after the state builds residential mental health units, but no later than July 1, 2011.

This year's budget includes more than $50 million for construction and $4 million for staffing in the Office of Mental Health and Department of Correctional Services. By 2010-11, $29 million will be added to the budget to implement the program, Spitzer spokesman Matt Anderson said.

Prison reform and mental health advocates say SHUs are cruel and have led to suicides. Some prison officials and correction officers have expressed concern about safety and the extra training they should have in order to deal with some mentally ill inmates. The issue has been before the Legislature for at least five years.

"Placing prisoners in solitary confinement has been an inhumane form of punishment for those already suffering with severe psychiatric disabilities," said Leah Gitter of Mental Health Alternatives to Solitary Confinement.

Gannett News Service contributed to this report.

SHU BILL PASSES
STATEMENT FROM MHASC

Harvey Rosenthal, NYARPS

January 16, 2008

Five years ago, a group of ex-prisoners with psychiatric disabilities, family members of confined prisoners, mental health and prisoners’ rights groups, and a broad array of community mental health and disability advocacy groups came together to mount an effort to stop the use of inhumane disciplinary solitary confinements for prisoners with psychiatric disabilities.

The determined groups decided to launch a multi-tiered campaign involving legislation, litigation and grassroots organizing aimed at convincing state leaders and the public to replace, in the words of the ex-prisoners and their families, "torture with treatment."

The groups saw the bill go through the Assembly for a few years, pass both houses for the past two years thanks to the great leadership of our legislative champions Assembly Mental Health Corrections Committee Chair Jeff Aubry and Senate Corrections Committee Chair Michael Nozzolio, and overcome previous gubernatorial opposition thanks to a concerted effort by the Spitzer Administration.

Yesterday, both houses of the New York State legislature at long last approved the measure, with the full encouragement of Governor Spitzer, who has promised to sign it shortly into law.

Thanks to extraordinary dedication and tireless effort by the advocates, the lawyers, and the legislative sponsors and the determined efforts by Governor Spitzer and his Administration, we now have both a legal settlement and approved legislation that will ultimately commit over $120 million to construct a broad array of alternative treatment based settings in NewYork State prisons and a package of fundamental reforms in how prisoners with psychiatric disabilities will be treated.

Along the way, the campaign captured the hearts of the public across New York with over 12 prominent newspapers giving repeated editorial support to their cause.  

There are so very many many people to thank . . . so many people who never gave up in the face of all the many disappointments such efforts inevitably face along the way. This has been truly a blessed effort, one that should give "experience, strength and hope" to all the brave campaigns that lay ahead.

We agree with Office of Mental Health Commissioner Mike Hogan: we must now turn our efforts to helping to keep so many within our community out of prison and jail and, when incarcerations do occur, to help them make a successful re-entry into their communities. But for today, we celebrate this extraordinary historic achievement.