DRA horizontal logo

Jails & Prisons

DRA, DecARcerate release report on solitary confinement in Arkansas

Solitary Confinement in Arkansas Prisons

Decarcerate and Disability Rights Arkansas announce the release of our report on the Arkansas Department of Correction’s use of solitary confinement. Read the report here: bit.ly/solitaryreport

Here are the major findings:

  • ADC’s use of solitary is the highest in the U.S. and is almost 4 times the national average.
  • Every 3 months, 2,600-3,500 people in ADC prisons are sent to ‘solitary’ and are exposed to its harmful effects.
  • Most people believe that only the ‘worst of the worst’ go to solitary confinement, but the truth is that almost all ADC ‘solitary’ placements are for non-violent, minor offenses. Under 10% of infractions resulting in a ‘solitary’ placement are due to violence or a threat of violence.
  • 73% of people in solitary confinement have been there more than 6 months and 42% for one year or longer, and some more than 6 years.
  • Black men and women and Hispanic women are held in solitary confinement at much higher rates compared to their numbers in the general prison population.
  • Solitary confinement creates serious mental illness (SMI) and worsens pre-existing mental illness. Yet, the ADC claims that only 3% of the total ADC prison population has SMI. That is much lower than U.S. Bureau of Justice data: ~50% of people in state prisons report SMI symptoms and ~12% of the U.S. adult non-incarcerated adult population has SMI. This under-recognition of SMI in ADC prisons means people with SMI do not get needed treatment, are more likely to be disciplined with ‘solitary,’ and are likely to have much worse mental health when they leave prison.
  • In ADC prisons, suicide attempts and suicides are much more common in solitary than in general housing.
  • ADC releases people directly from solitary to the community, posing a serious public safety risk.
  • ADC policy allows broad discretion in how solitary may be used as punishment and extended stays of a year or more.
  • Programs meant to help people move out of solitary are ineffective. Few people graduate; most remain in solitary.
  • The ADC has no strategic plan for reducing its use of solitary confinement.

Earlier, DRA Executive Director Tom Masseau issued the following statement related to Arkansas’s overuse of solitary confinement:

“Solitary confinement is an archaic and grossly overused practice, one which is devastating in its effects on mental health. Its use should be ended immediately. It is shameful that Arkansas leads the nation in the use of solitary confinement. We call on the Arkansas Department of Corrections and policymakers to come together to enhance programs that emphasize rehabilitation in prison settings, and to ban outright the use of solitary confinement.”

Speak Up Arkansas sheds light on the horrors of solitary confinement

KABF 88.3 logo: a black background with a yellow shape of the state of Arkansas. In black lettering, the words KABF FM 88.3, Little Rock, AR, on air since '84, with a radio tower motif in black.

Nine out of ten people who spend time in prison in Arkansas eventually return home to their communities to begin a new life. And what happens in prison doesn’t necessarily stay in prison: a person who is released to begin anew brings with him or her the cumulative effects of all they experienced inside prison walls. What happened to them while they served time? How did that experience affect them? And then, how does it affect the way they are able to interact with their communities once released? That’s a question that concerns all of us – not only as family and community members, but as taxpayers.

Disability Rights Arkansas recently joined forces with DecARcerate Arkansas to publish a report focusing on solitary confinement in Arkansas’s prisons. The report examines Arkansas’s use of solitary confinement, which is four times the national average – the highest in the country. Tonight on Speak Up Arkansas, we’re going to talk about the findings of the report, and the use of solitary confinement in our state’s prisons. Who goes to solitary? Why? For how long? What are the effects that solitary confinement has on prisoners? And why what happens in solitary matters to ALL of us. We examine these questions – and hear powerful and painful first-person accounts of life in solitary. Solitary confinement in Arkansas’s prisons is our topic tonight on Speak Up Arkansas.

Guests include co-chairs Morgan Leyenberger and Laura Berry of the Movement to End Solitary Confinement; David Morgan, a formerly incarcerated juvenile who was serving life without parole; and Kris Stewart, an advocate with DRA.

You can listen live TONIGHT at 5:00 p.m. on KABF 88.3 FM or livestream the show at KABF.org. And as always, we’ll be posting the show recording on our website so you can listen later and share anytime.

SHOW NOTES

The upcoming report Solitary Confinement in Arkansas, authored by Nancy Dockter in partnership with DecARcerate and Disability Rights Arkansas, will be available at both organizations’ websites upon its release in January. We’ll post links at that time.

Get involved in the movement to end solitary confinement, keep up with legislative updates, etc. at DecARcerate’s website – https://www.decarceratear.org/

Lawyers, formerly incarcerated people and their families speak out

KABF 88.3 logo: a black background with a yellow shape of the state of Arkansas. In black lettering, the words KABF FM 88.3, Little Rock, AR, on air since '84, with a radio tower motif in black.

Earlier this year, Disability Rights Arkansas joined the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the ACLU of Arkansas, and the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs to file a lawsuit against Governor Asa Hutchinson and Arkansas Department of Corrections officials on behalf of Arkansas state prisoners over the inadequate measures to prevent the transmission of COVID-19 in the prisons. The virus has spread illness and caused numerous deaths at state correctional facilities. Prisoners, including the plaintiffs in this case, are disproportionately Black and have significantly higher rates of serious medical conditions, like heart disease, respiratory illness, and diabetes that make them especially vulnerable to severe illness or death from the virus. The lawsuit alleges that the outbreak in the prisons was made exponentially worse by the failure of state officials to conduct adequate testing and to adhere to guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control – failing to provide masks and other personal protective equipment, access to soap and sanitizer, and cleaning products. This, combined with the inability of inmates to socially distance, has been a recipe for disaster in Arkansas prisons.

Tonight on Speak Up Arkansas, we will be speaking to the lawyers who are fighting to protect the civil rights of Arkansas prisoners, and we’ll be joined by some of the families who have been personally impacted by the outbreak. The show will air tonight at 5:00 p.m. on KABF 88.3 FM. You can livestream the program at kabf.org. And as always, you’ll find the recording of the show on our website at disabilityrightsAR.org/Speak-Up-Arkansas. This is Show #9.

Tonight’s guests include DRA attorney Cristy Park; Omavi Shukur, attorney with the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund (LDF); and Sarah Everett, attorney with the ACLU of Arkansas.

We also have with us several former inmates and family members who were gracious enough to join us to tell their stories: Randi Harper, whose father Randy Hobbs is currently incarcerated in the Medical Unit at the Ouachita River Unit in Malvern; Michael Wiggins, who was recently released from the East Arkansas Correctional Unit; Audrey Brown, whose son Damion Brown is currently incarcerated at Cummins; Austin Mitchell, who was incarcerated at the Central Arkansas Community Correctional Facility; and Dana and Shana Wilson, family members of inmates Arthur and Lamarr Brown. We are deeply  grateful to all of these guests for coming on this evening to speak with us.

SHOW NOTES:

If you are a family member with information about a loved one who is incarcerated, and need to speak with someone about this case, you can contact NAACP-LDF toll-free 1-833-523-0354. You’ll be prompted to leave certain information about the incarcerated individual, and a volunteer with LDF will call you back.

The petition for the clemency of Arthur and Lamarr Davis, referenced by Dana and Shana Wilson during tonight’s show, can be found here: https://sign.moveon.org/petitions/justicefordavisbrothers-governor-asa-hutchinson-must-grant-time-cut-clemency-now?source=facebook-share-button&time=1591062780&utm_source=facebook&share=7fdabcd9-9b1b-4e49-aa3c-31afc1371567&fbclid=IwAR0UWyiruvrrsWFo4JOyXXW9FX5SOgXw6tshSYReEZJg0_5aEaqSTy6xjSo

DRA, other civil rights lawyers file complaint against state officials over COVID-19 outbreaks in Arkansas state prisons

Disability Rights Arkansas

LITTLE ROCK – Today, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), the law firm Squire Patton Boggs, Disability Rights Arkansas, and American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas filed an emergency complaint against Governor Asa Hutchinson and Arkansas Department of Corrections (ADC) officials on behalf of Arkansas state prisoners over the inadequate measures to prevent COVID-19 transmission, illness, and death in state correctional facilities. Yesterday, it was reported that Cummins Unit, a state prison, had 600 confirmed COVID-19 infections—only nine days after the first prisoner tested positive in that facility. Incarcerated individuals currently make up approximately one-third of all confirmed COVID-19 cases statewide. Prisoners, including the plaintiffs in this lawsuit, are disproportionately Black and have significantly higher rates of serious medical conditions, like heart disease, respiratory illness, and diabetes that make them especially vulnerable to severe illness or death from the virus. State officials have worsened these risks by failing to take essential measures to ensure social distancing, safe and sanitary conditions, and ready access to hygiene products, cleaning supplies, and personal protective equipment.

“The startling viral outbreak in the Arkansas prison system places thousands of incarcerated people at risk of serious illness or death, but this crisis extends far beyond prison walls. It is only a matter of time when the virus will spread from prisons to the surrounding communities, depleting scarce healthcare resources,” said Jin Hee Lee, Senior Deputy Director of Litigation at LDF. “The devastating harms of this pandemic already disproportionately fall on Black Arkansans, who are infected with and die from COVID-19 at double their percentage of the state population. This racial disparity will deepen from viral outbreaks in prisons, which are mostly located in Southeastern Arkansas where there are higher concentrations of Black residents.”

“Our organization is charged with investigating and preventing abuse or neglect wherever we find it,” said Tom Masseau, Executive Director at Disability Rights Arkansas. “Nowhere has the response to this unprecedented event been more lacking than in the prison system. While Arkansas has benefited greatly from utilizing social distancing measures, frequent hygiene, and the use of personal protective equipment, the population of incarcerated individuals have not had this luxury. Many inmates within the Arkansas prison system have disabilities or chronic conditions that place them at a greater risk of testing positive for COVID-19. We are calling upon the Governor and Secretary of the Arkansas Department of Corrections to take immediate steps to ensure the safety of individuals in their care. They cannot simply ignore the healthcare risks of inmates who have disabilities or have a chronic illness within the correctional system.”

“Without stronger action by state officials, Arkansas’ overcrowded prisons are becoming a humanitarian and public health catastrophe,” said Holly Dickson, Legal Director & Interim Executive Director at the ACLU of Arkansas. “This is an imminent threat to public health that disproportionately endangers the lives of Black Arkansans, who are four times more likely to be imprisoned than whites. It is critical that state officials heed the advice of public health experts and immediately reduce the state prison population to a level where social distancing is possible.”

The COVID-19 pandemic poses an especially severe public health risk in correctional facilities, which incarcerate Black individuals at five times the rate of white individuals nationwide. Inmates typically reside in crowded facilities where they are unable to practice social distancing and frequently lack ready access to soap, sanitizer, cleaning products, and personal protective equipment (PPE). Currently, incarcerated people make up approximately one in three verified COVID-19 infections statewide. Even with these alarming figures, the actual number of COVID-19 infections in prisons is likely much higher due to the lack of widespread testing. Prisoners who are elderly and who have serious underlying medical conditions, like respiratory illness, heart disease, obesity, diabetes, and hypertension are especially vulnerable to severe, if not fatal, complications from the virus. Despite these factors, Arkansas officials are failing to adhere to established guidelines issued a month ago by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention specifically for correctional facilities to protect against COVID-19 spread and illness.

Read the full complaint here.

Have Prisons and Jails Simply Replaced Institutions in Warehousing People with Mental Illness and Cognitive Disabilities?

In what was widely regarded as a positive development in the United States, the number of individuals residing in institutions plunged from nearly 560,000 in 1955 to approximately 70,000 in 1994.  Unfortunately, this move was not followed by sufficient community resources to meet the needs of this population.  Some subsequently ended up being routed to the criminal justice system, often because of misdemeanors and other mild infractions of the law (like loitering).  It is now estimated that “federal and state jails and prisons are now home to three times as many people with mental health conditions as state mental hospitals” and “Prison inmates are four times as likely and jail inmates more than six times as likely to report a cognitive disability than the general population”, according to an article by the Center for American Progress.

As with other forms of institutionalized care, incarceration is a much more expensive route to housing and “caring” for people with disabilities, and that is assuming individuals in prisons and jails are getting the services they need, which they may not be.  And, once an individual is released, all of the barriers an ex-convict encounters while trying to reintegrate into society can be compounded by the lack of services appropriate to meet the needs of the person with a disability.

For more information, follow this link to the Center for American Progress article:  Disabled Behind Bars The Mass Incarceration of People With Disabilities in America’s Jails and Prisons.