Torture or safety mechanism? Lawmakers looking closely at the use of solitary confinement in state prisons

By DANYAL MOHAMMADZADEH, Legislative Gazette Staff Writer |04.27.2015

Senator Perkins was a proud co-host of a recent public education event concerning the HALT Solitary Confinement Act, A.4401 | S.2659.  The Senator’s message was clear: 

“We have a human rights crisis here in New York State; over 4,000 individuals—many of the most vulnerable and defenseless among us—are subject to state-sanctioned torture, in the form of solitary confinement.

In 2011, the United Nations Special Rapporteur agreed with this assessment, calling solitary confinement “torture”—plain and simple.

Human rights don’t get all the attention they should in this building, in particular the issue of solitary confinement; some people seem to think that human rights stop at the jailhouse door—or that the state should turn a blind eye to the torture and injustice it presently authorizes.

However, we know that isolated confinement is an inhumane, dehumanizing and counterproductive practice from which nothing positive can follow—individuals who need intense intervention are cut off from all resources but underlying issues remain entrenched—and the goals of public safety, human dignity and rehabilitation are fundamentally sacrificed.” 

See the full story here.