Solitary Confinement and Mental Health Issues in Corrections

Functions, Issues, and Objectives in Corrections
Introduction
The functions of the historical state correctional system have changed since the founding of the nation more than 200 years ago. The Jacksonian Era, the Era of Reconstruction and the Progressive Era on up to the reform of the 1970s all effected different changes to the function—i.e., the goals and activities—of the correctional system. Pennsylvania’s state correctional system was the first to introduce solitary confinement as a way of removing the deviant element from society. This was part of William Penn’s attempt at social reform, a fundamental characteristic of his Quaker ideals (Fantel, 1974). The goal of Penn’s plan was to promote moral rehabilitation and it was believed that through the inmate’s lengthy time alone to reflect on his misdeeds he would begin to develop the moral resolve to reform himself and become a better contributing member of society. Today, solitary confinement is a controversial option in the state correctional system and not one that is used with the same goal in mind as when Pennsylvania instituted the reform-minded approach to corrections. This paper will look at the functions of the state correctional system, analyze criminal justice issues, examine the impacts of incarceration and social justice issues for one correctional institution and one private institution, identify cultural sensitivity and diversity awareness issues, discuss two methods of alternative sentencing, and evaluate the effectiveness of a correctional institution and a private institution.
Functions
The goals of the contemporary state correctional system compared to Pennsylvania’s historical state correctional system are similar in spirit but quite different in terms of function. Today’s activities of the contemporary state correctional system do not focus on removing the deviant from society but rather on building up the character of the prisoner and providing work for the prisoner, education, health care, and support so that the prisoner can rehabilitate and re-enter society with a new set of skills that can be applied to sustainability.
These activities include earning a GED programs, learning new skills programs such as masonry like what the Florida state corrections system offers to inmates (Florida Department of Corrections, 2020). By providing the average inmate opportunities to improve him or herself by using the time available in the prison to the best possible advantage, the corrections system makes improving the chances for rehabilitation the main prospect. However, there are still punitive approaches that remain and not every state corrections system is the same. Some adopt more punitive approaches than others. But overall the trend is towards more humane practices and chances for improvement like what the Florida corrections system has done as opposed to placing an all-out emphasis on punitive practices.
Criminal Justice Issues for Corrections Personnel and the Rights of Offenders
Corrections personnel have to be mindful of prisoners’ rights today, as the case of Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539 (1974) showed. This was the United States Supreme Court that clarified the due process rights of prisoners. The case addressed the issue of how the corrections system could implement punitive measures, particularly with respect to inmates’ good time credits, i.e., credits that the inmates earn and build up over time for good behavior, which they can use for perks in the prison. These credits are an incentive for reform and the prisoners accumulate them in good faith that they can exchange the credits as promised for additional benefits. However, when the California prison sought to take away prisoners’ credits without giving them an opportunity to defend themselves in a hearing, the case went to the Supreme Court where it was established that prisoners have a right to due process even in prison. This was an important ruling because due process has been defined as “the highest safeguard of liberty” (Oaks, 1965, p. 243).
Thus, punishments cannot be implemented unilaterally without regard for inmates’ right to due process; nor can rehabilitation involve the use of cruel or unusual punishment. As Richmond (2015) points out, solitary confinement has been used as a form of cruel and unusual punishment and has been linked to severe negative side effects on prisoners to the point where it can no longer be justified because of the psychological harm it causes. Today, there is a mandatory standard of living that all prisoners have a right to (Stojkovic & Lovell, 2019). And the provision of mental health services is one of those rights, which should be part of that standard of living (Compton et al., 2017).
The problems that corrections personnel face, however, is how to ensure their own safety and the safety of prisoners while maintaining an environment of cultural sensitivity, support, civility and due process. In the control model of the corrections institution there are issues here because the personnel attempt to exert total control over the prisoners, which appears to deny the prisoners their right to due process and to human respect. The responsibility model has been employed in the past but is not a model that can be used in every case, particularly with prisoners who have no intention of reforming themselves. The consensual model involves prisoners taking part in the administration of the prison and was used in California in the 1970s, but it presents its own set of problems as well with respect to maintaining discipline and security for prisoners and the staff (Stojkovic & Lovell, 2019).
Impacts of Incarceration and Social Justice Issues
Correctional Institution
The Minnesota Department of Corrections offers supervised release programs for prisoners who have served two-thirds of their sentence in prison. The final one-third is offered through supervised release (MN, 2020). Social justice suggests that former prisoners be given support as they shift their lives from prison to the community, and the supervised release programs facilitates that goal as well as the criminal justice objective of rehabilitation.
Another example of social justice among correctional institutions is that of the Florida Department of Corrections (2020), which offers the Paving New Roads to Construction program for inmates so that they can learn a useful skill so that they can find employment when released from incarceration. In terms of social justice the Florida Department of Corrections is promoting the development of a skill that the inmates can put to use so as to obtain a better social status once they are reintegrated into society. In terms of criminal justice the learning of the skill promotes rehabilitation and fosters within the inmates the desire to make something of themselves so that when they leave the prison they are no longer feeling isolated or dependent upon a life of crime. It also reduces the risk of recidivism, which has a positive impact on incarceration rates.
Private Institution
As Seiter (2014) explains, private corrections institutions are accountable to the public and so do play a part in achieving social justice goals as well. However, as the case of Kingman Prison in Arizona shows, private prisons also have to maintain discipline and a tight culture, otherwise they run the risk of inmates escaping, as happened at Kingman (Hensley & Rough, 2011).
Kingman offers ABE and Contracted Outside Work Crews work programs as well as opportunities for inmates to earn their GEDs. Treatment programs it offers include the Alcohol and Substance Abuse Treatment program (Corrections Arizona Department, 2020). Thus, the private institution offers the same kind of commitment to social justice issues that state correctional facilities offer. The key point to be made here is that private institutions are not really much different from state run facilities as both are accountable to the public and both have safety regulations that they have to follow (Seiter, 2014). When it comes to the administration of the prison, that is where culture can become lax but when mistakes are made it is an obvious opportunity for learning and improvement and the lax culture that existed at Kingman has changed since the escape of prisoners nearly a decade ago.
Culturally Sensitive Issues
The spread of disease in prisons is an important issue that has to be addressed. As the CDC reports, of the 2 million people jailed in the U.S., more than 20,000 inmates have HIV (HIV among Incarcerated Populations, 2015). The rate of incidence is five times higher for prisoners than for people in the public and nine out of every ten infected in prison are male. The sharing of needles and sex in prison is something that has to be addressed but because it is a culturally sensitive issue, it is something that has to be approached with a degree of cultural competency.
Another issue is the social structure of prisons, where there are numerous ethnicities and gang members and an obvious pecking order and socio-cultural hierarchy emerges. Clemmer (1940) described the prison community of the average American corrections facility in this manner: “The prisoner’s world is an atomized world. Its people are atoms acting in confusion. It is dominated and it submits. Its own community is without a well-established social structure. Recognized values produce a myriad of conflicting attitudes…” (p. 1). However, today, culture is huge and the culture of gangs in prisons is important to consider because these gang members are “the unlikely custodians of order behind bars” (Wood, 2014). Wood (2014) explains that “Prison gangs end up providing governance in a brutal but effective way. They impose responsibility on everyone, and in some ways the prisons run more smoothly because of them.” In other words, they set the cultural tone in prison.
However, racial tensions can emerge and that is very problematic for prison administrators. For example, at Corcoran State Prison, prison guards were having rival gang members face off against one another in the yards and they were doing it for their own coliseum-like enjoyment. They knew full well the tensions would lead to violence and they did not bother to have any cultural sensitivity about what they were doing by having these groups mix in the yard during recreation (Dryburgh, 2009).
There is also the problem of race in the system and how it appears that black Americans are disproportionately incarcerated. The Sentencing Project (2016) states for instance that “more than 60% of the people in prison today are people of color. Black men are nearly six times as likely to be incarcerated as white men and Hispanic men are 2.3 times as likely. For black men in their thirties, 1 in every 10 is in prison or jail on any given day” (p. 5). This is an enormous cultural problem not just for prisons but also for society as a whole. It suggests that more needs to be done in terms of alternative sentencing to help create a more equitable system.
Alternative Sentencing
Restorative justice is one alternative sentencing solution that can be used as opposed to incarceration. Johnson et al. (2015) have found, in fact, that restorative justice programs are very effective at lowering recidivism rates: among individuals who completed a restorative justice program, the recidivism rate fell by 26% against a 10% drop in recidivism rates among individuals who went through the traditional justice system (Johnson et al., 2015). Restorative justice can keep more people out of prisons, which has a positive effect not just on the offender’s life but also on the lives of others. Jannetta and Okeke (2017) note for example that that decarceration in the criminal justice system “would yield benefits to young adults, as well as juveniles with incarcerated parents” (p. 14). Restorative justice also helps to make victims and people in the community feel better about how justice is being applied: “victims reported higher perceptions of fairness and greater feelings of justice through the restorative justice programs as opposed to victim reports of traditional justice programs” (Johnson et al., 2015, p. 2349). Additionally, restorative justice has led to recidivism rates falling by more than a quarter in regions in the US where it has been implemented (Johnson et al., 2015).
Another sentencing alternative is electronic monitoring, which keeps individuals out of prisons, and allows them to be in their homes and communities where they can still contribute in a meaningful way to their own lives and to the lives of others around them. Instead of having to be stuck in a prison where they may be exposed to other negative influences, drug use and risky sexual behavior, they can avoid that environment and focus on rehabilitation in their own community.
Effectiveness of a Correctional Institution
State Corrections
The effectiveness of South Carolina Department of Corrections (SCDC) is evident in the fact that it is adopting a more social justice orientation in its approach to rehabilitating inmates. It is focusing on rehabilitation and reentry, as there is a link to an article about how the SCDC is working to rehabilitate its inmates and get them ready to reenter society in its Twitter feed. The SCDC is focused on using compassion to increase inmates’ sense of self-worth and to help them to become self-actualizing, which is the goal of Maslow’s theory of the hierarchy of needs and human motivation model. The SCDC is a good example of a state corrections system that is committed to addressing social and criminal justice issues, particularly those issues that relate to how to ready prisoners for reentry into society so that they do not become recidivists and end up right back in jail. The function of the correctional system the SCDC is focused on improving is the ability to rehabilitate through humane approaches that treat prisoners like real people who have made mistakes but who are capable of changing their lives for the better and becoming more positive contributors to society. Thus, the SCDC has made compassion the foundation of its approach and has aimed at adopting a more humanistic method that is person-centered. This is a highly effective method of interacting with prisoners and of producing results that matter.
Private Institution
The private institution that has taken steps to address health care issues among the vulnerable and underserved prison population is Kingman Prison in Arizona. As Rich et al. (2014) note, “drawing incarcerated populations into the community health care framework is critical for the nation, and it is especially relevant for poor communities, communities of color, and other socially marginalized groups that are both disproportionately imprisoned and often disenfranchised from medical care” (p. 464). Care could also be improved in prisons (Rich et al., 2014). The Affordable Care Act called for more accountability among care organizations and correctional health could easily fall under this mandate. In the private institution of Kingman Prison, efforts have been made and have been shown to be effective at improving the health of prisoners who need treatment for mental health, addiction, and other issues.
However, making sure that this is the standard across the board is really what is needed, and that would require new regulations. Yet, because the prison industry has been privatized to a large extent there are problems of conflicts of interest that also need to be addressed. Corrections institutions are not just supposed to be a place where punitive courses of action are pursued, where prisoners are sent for the sake of justice. Social justice also has to be considered, and in the context of social justice corrections offers an opportunity for inmates to grow, develop, mature, and take responsibility for their lives and actions (Stojkovic & Lovell, 2019). Thus, this is a significant issue that affects the population’s health, the government’s role in overseeing corrections facilities, private industry, and the criminal justice system. If left untreated, the prison population’s health will only worsen with time. The private institution of Kingman Prison has taken the initiative of addressing the health of its inmates by improving access to care and by offering treatment programs that provide the mental health counseling and support network they need to get a handle on their addictions and begin to improve their own lives.
Conclusion
The corrections industry, whether private or state-run, has a responsibility to reach social goals that benefit the community and the prisoner alike. Since the formation of the corrections system reform and rehabilitation have been goals, though punitive approaches have also been part of the system. Under William Penn, the first approach to solitary confinement was adopted and this was done not to punish so much as to give the prisoner time for solitude and mental, prayerful reflection. The aim was to help the prisoner adopt a more introspective mentality. However, there was also an element of the need to remove the deviant from the rest of society. Over time, this approach or over-reliance on solitary confinement has been viewed as cruel and unusual punishment. The Supreme Court has ruled that prisoners have the Constitutional Right to due process and that cruel and unusual punishment is prohibited by the Constitution. Thus, prisons today focus on rehabilitation in proactive ways, i.e., by getting prisoners involved in programs that will teach them skills or help them to earn a degree. They also provide them with mental health services and use alternative sentencing approaches such as restorative justice and electronic monitoring to keep people in their communities instead of locked away where they may fall under negative influences.
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