were males, 7221, and the rest 564 were females. In order to see if the participates had any sort of mental illness they looked at self reported treatment, related to mental health (Biltz). The results of this study found that the amount of inmates that participating in this study had a disproportionally number of inmates with mental healthy that were physically victimized. According to this study prisons are a violent and unsafe place for people who suffer from mental illness (Biltz). Male inmates who suffered from any form of mental illness were nearly 1.6 times more likely to be physically victimized while in prison. Females inmates who had a mental illness were even more likely to suffer from physical victimization, they were nearly 2 times more likely than male inmates with mental illness (Blitz). Inmates that were African Americans and Hispanics were more likely to be physically victimized either by inmates or staff.
An article was released by the The Journal of American Academy of Psychiatry and Law which they discuses the challenge that medical doctors face when dealing with inmates that have experienced solitary confinement. Solitary confinement involves isolation from other inmates or any form of communication which has been linked to physical torture (Metzner). Inmates that are either in Supermax prions or wings of prisons that are only solitary confinement, experience abnormal environment, extreme security and only are allowed fours a week to leave their cell (Metzner). Solitary confinement can be very hurtful to an inmate’s mental health especially if they if they have pre existing mental illnesses, if they are in solitary confinement for an extensive period of time and if they have anything available such as radios ...
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...re have been many studies that have been conducted in the past before the 2000’s, however for this paper those studies were not useful due to the fact that the use of current evidence was the upmost importance. Another limitation to the topic of this paper is that, the studies only include males usually. There has been little information published related to juveniles and women who face administrative segregation or solitary confinement. The hopes of these changes will help reduce the amount of self-harm that is experienced in prisons and jails.
More studies need to be done to see if the likelihood of mental illness increases in prisoners who have been in solitary. Studies also need to look at inmates who suffer from mental illnesses before solitary confinement and see if solitary confinement makes their symptoms worse or even their mental illness as a whole worse.
Yet, solitary confinement is still considered necessary in order to maintain control within the prison and among inmates. Solitary confinement is seen as an effective method in protecting specific prisoners and altering violent/aggressive disobedient behaviors, (Maria A. Luise, Solitary Confinement: Legal and Psychological Considerations, 15 New Eng. J. on Crim. & Civ. Confinement 301, 324 (1989) p. 301). There is some discrepancy among researchers as to the varying effects on inmates who have undergone an extensive solitary confinement stay. Most researchers find that inmates who had no previous form of mental illness suffer far less than those who do, yet most if not all of these individuals still experience some difficulties with concentration and memory, agitation, irritability, and will have issues tolerating external stimuli, (Stuart Grassian, Psychiatric Effects of Solitary Confinement, 22 Wash. U. J. L. & Pol’y 325 (2006) p. 332). Although these detrimental psychiatric repercussions of solitary confinement currently appear, several researches have made suggestions as to how these may be avoided. These requirements being that
Kaba, Fatos, et al. “Solitary Confinement and Risk of Self-Harm Among Jail Inmates.” American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, Mar. 2014, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3953781/.
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 an article by NPR.org the reason for most solitary confinement units in America “is to control the prison gangs (NPR, 2011).” Sometimes putting a gang member in solitary confinement reduces the effect that confinement is supposed to have when the confined inmate starts losing their mind. 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 or she is in prison and why they are being punished is gone, there is no reason to keep said prisoner in solitary confinement. Once your ability to understand punishment is gone the consequences of your actions lose value and become irrelevant.
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 system.
The negative effects of the long-term use of solitary confinement in prisons has been under the spot light for years, and has been considered to be broken. The maltreatment of prisoners is a constant
Metzner, J. L., & Fellner, J. (2010). Solitary Confinement and Mental Illness in U.S. Prisons: A Challenge for Medical Ethics. The Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 38(1), 104-108.
Victims must adapt methods that secure their safety and survival. Traits of aggression and intimidation establish themselves in the victim’s personality for self-protection. In Grounds’ study (2004), fourteen of the eighteen men were terrorized by threats of assault and even death. Three of the men were victims of violence, with one being sexually assaulted and the other one stabbed. Inmates may cope with depression through withdrawal, self-mutilation, or suicide.
In fact, one of the most leading violence in the prison setting is sexual victimization. It involves different behaviors from sexually abusive contact to nonconsensual sexual assault. These assaults present bigger issues within the prison such as being exposed to sexually transmitted diseases like HIV, causing the inmate to retaliate, depression and suicidal gestures. (Wolf, N, 2006) In 2011, a random sample of not less than 10% of all federal, state prisons, county prisons, and municipal prisons in America was drawn. At the end of the annual sample, 8,763 allegations of sexual victimization were reported by the Bureau of Justice Statistics. (Roberts, N., 2014) As stated, this only included 10% percent of the prison excluding the other 90 % of prisons in America. In 2009, 7,855 allegations were filed and in 2010, 8,404 with 51 percent involving nonconsensual sex acts or abusive contact amongst inmates. The other 49% involved prison staff that resulted in sexual misconduct and sexual harassment. In 2012, the Department of Justice estimated that about 1 in 10 inmates were sexually assaulted by officers with high expectation that it would only continue to increase. (Roberts, N.,
The effects of prolonged isolation for inmates in confinement cells are obsessive-compulsive tendencies, paranoia, anger-management issues, and severe anxiety (Sifferlin, Alexandra). Along with the basic concepts such as food, water, and shelter, there are two other basics that Dr. Terry Kupers states are required for human wellbeing: “social interaction and meaningful activity. By doing things we learn who we are and we learn our worth as a person. The two things solitary confinement does are make people solitary and idle” (Sifferlin, Alexandra). Isolation and confinement remove prisoners’ ability to perform significant tasks and act as a part of society. This dehumanizes the inmates because they are no longer able to understand their role as a human being. One inmate, Jeanne DiMola, spent a year in solitary confinement and expressed her thoughts while in the cell: “I felt sorry I was born … Most of all I felt sorry that there wasn 't a road to kill myself because every day was worse than the last" (Rodhan, Maya). In DiMola’s opinion, a death penalty more than likely would have felt more humane than the isolation she experienced. Another prisoner, Damon Thibodeaux, stated, “Life in solitary is made all the worse because it 's a hopeless existence … It is torture
There are some inmates in jails and prisons that have a mental illness. It has been estimated that 10% to 16% of at adults in U.S prisons and jails have some kind of a mental illness (Mackain and Messer. p.89). It was calculated that 10% of male and 18% of females have a serious mental disorder (Mackain and Messer. p.89)...
Thousands of people statewide are in prisons, all for different reasons. However, the amount of mental illness within prisons seems to go unaddressed and ignored throughout the country. This is a serious problem, and the therapy/rehabilitation that prison systems have do not always help those who are mentally ill. Prison involvement itself can contribute to increased suicide (Hills, Holly). One ‘therapy’ that has increased throughout the years has been the use of solitary confinement, which has many negative effects on the inmates.
Over 200 inmates around the country being held in different forms of solitude were asked about their symptoms. All of the inmates shared similar symptoms. Over half of the inmates showed: disorientation, hallucinations, panic attacks, hypersensitivity to stimuli, focus issues, sedated mental activity, memory loss, aggressive thoughts, paranoia, and self-control issues. Increased sensitivity to stimuli was reported. They experience few stimuli in solitary, and they grow accustomed to the lack of stimuli.
Prior to taking this course, I generally believed that people were rightly in prison due to their actions. Now, I have become aware of the discrepancies and flaws within the Criminal Justice system. One of the biggest discrepancies aside from the imprisonment rate between black and white men, is mental illness. Something I wished we covered more in class. The conversation about mental illness is one that we are just recently beginning to have. For quite a while, mental illness was not something people talked about publicly. This conversation has a shorter history in American prisons. Throughout the semester I have read articles regarding the Criminal Justice system and mental illness in the United States. Below I will attempt to describe how the Criminal Justice system fails when they are encountered by people with mental illnesses.
Longitudinal research has been conducted comparing the rate of violence in male and female prisons. It is important to do research on this topic because it does not only lead to the conclusion of where is violence prevalent, but focuses on other aspects as well. It focuses on the psychological, social, and sexual side of the inmate. This topic does not only focus on who has the highest rates of violence, but why does that sex have a higher rate. This topic looks deeper at the differences between male and female inmates and what causes them to have high rates of violence. Most people would say that male prisons have a higher rate of violence due to biological reasons. People tend to think that males are more aggressive therefore violence is prevalent in male prisons, yet there is a lot more to this idea.
In the court case Langley v. Coughlin, a maximum security women’s prison in Bedford Hills, New York had their solitary confinement evaluated (Grassian). Out of the women interviewed from the prison “a very high percentage of the women had a history of serious emotional or organic mental difficulties” (Grassian). These mental illnesses combined with the environment of a prison eventually caused these women to be put in isolation (Grassian). The isolation caused their illnesses to magnify, “many became grossly disorganized and psychotic, smearing themselves with feces, mumbling and screaming incoherently all day and night, some even descending to the horror of eating parts of their own bodies” (Grassian). The court decided there was no guilty party but ordered the prison to stop the isolation of prisoners whose “emotional condition has deteriorated during their incarceration in [solitary confinement]” (Grassian). The New York prison originally added time onto a prisoner’s solitary confinement sentence when they were showing that their behavior hadn’t changed (Grassian). The court ordered for them to be treated in a psychiatric unit at the prison which showed a decrease in need for security for these prisoners