Punishing Mental Illness: Trans-institutionalization and Solitary Confinement in the United States

This chapter explores how civil society advocacy campaigns working to reform and abolish solitary confinement are interacting with recent and ongoing federal litigation. The authors posit that the evolution of policy, practice, litigation, and public knowledge regarding solitary confinement is pushing the law forward. Momentum for greater legal protections is growing in the courts and the combination of people power and jurisprudential development is leading to substantial new protections for prisoners, including the exclusion of vulnerable populations, such as youth, people with mental illness, and pregnant women, from solitary confinement. Additionally, courts are increasingly questioning the extreme duration of solitary confinement in the United States and the reasons used to justify it, such as automatic solitary confinement of people sentenced to death. At the same time, state departments of corrections are settling class action lawsuits brought on behalf of prisoners in solitary confinement by agreeing to major policy innovations and alternatives to the use of segregation.

Download Full-text

Torture in US Jails and Prisons: An Analysis of Solitary Confinement Under International Law

ICL Journal ◽

10.1515/icl-2013-0402 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 7 (4) ◽

Author(s):

Anna Conley

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Mental Illness ◽

Human Rights ◽

International Law ◽

The United States ◽

Severe Form ◽

Solitary Confinement ◽

Management Tool ◽

Self Mutilation ◽

The Us

AbstractOne of the most serious human rights violations today is occurring throughout the US. In US jails and prisons, individuals are held in solitary confinement for weeks, months and even years. Solitary confinement can cause significant psychological damage, including cognitive delays, increased suspicion and paranoia, increased anxiety, fear, aggression and hostility, heightened feelings of helplessness and depression, and increased thoughts and attempts at self-mutilation and suicide. Many prisoners held in this severe form of isolation are juveniles or individuals with serious mental illness, to whom it is particularly damaging. Although solitary confinement is common in the rest of the world, nowhere is it more prevalent as a long-term prisoner management tool than in the United States. US courts have found that solitary confinement is a violation of the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution in certain situations, yet the practice persists.As a global movement against solitary confinement grows, the United Nations and regional human rights tribunals have spoken out against the practice. A robust body of international case law has defined the contours of when solitary confinement is cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and the instances in which it is torture. International bodies prohibit solitary confinement for juveniles, prisoners with mental illness, and prisoners on death row or with life sentences. International tribunals generally find solitary confinement for all prisoners contrary to applicable law where it constitutes incommunicado detention, where it is unnecessarily prolonged without justification, and where the totality of conditions of confinement cross a threshold into unacceptable cruelty.As international law prohibiting solitary confinement crystallizes, the practice in the United States may be curtailed through reliance on international law by US judges. Further, the US executive may take an increased interest in curbing solitary confinement to avoid reputational damage among the global community.

Download Full-text

Mental illness is a risk factor for incarceration, and inmate populations are rising in the United States. What does this mean for the practice of psychiatry?

Clinical Psychiatry News ◽

10.1016/s0270-6644(12)70038-3 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 40 (2) ◽

pp. 8

Author(s):

PAUL J. FINK

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Mental Illness ◽

Risk Factor ◽

The United States

Download Full-text

Patterns and predictors of mental health service use and mental illness among older and younger adults in the United States.

Psychological Services ◽

10.1037/1541-1559.5.3.275 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 5 (3) ◽

pp. 275-294 ◽

Cited By ~ 47

Author(s):

Bradley E. Karlin ◽

Michael Duffy ◽

David H. Gleaves

Keyword(s):

Mental Health ◽

United States ◽

Mental Illness ◽

Mental Health Service ◽

Health Service ◽

Service Use ◽

The United States ◽

Mental Health Service Use ◽

Health Service Use ◽

Younger Adults

Download Full-text

Mental illness, drinking, and the social division and structure of labor in the United States: 2003-2015

American Journal of Industrial Medicine ◽

10.1002/ajim.22935 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 62 (2) ◽

pp. 131-144 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Seth J. Prins ◽

Sarah McKetta ◽

Jonathan Platt ◽

Carles Muntaner ◽

Katherine M. Keyes ◽

...

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Mental Illness ◽

The United States ◽

Social Division ◽

The Social

Download Full-text

The origins and persistence of psychosurgery in the state of Iowa

Neurosurgical FOCUS ◽

10.3171/2017.6.focus17227 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 43 (3) ◽

pp. E8 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Francis J. Jareczek ◽

Marshall T. Holland ◽

Matthew A. Howard ◽

Timothy Walch ◽

Taylor J. Abel

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Mental Illness ◽

The United States ◽

State Mental Health ◽

The State ◽

Medical Community ◽

State University ◽

University Of Iowa ◽

The University ◽

Frontal Lobotomy

Neurosurgery for the treatment of psychological disorders has a checkered history in the United States. Prior to the advent of antipsychotic medications, individuals with severe mental illness were institutionalized and subjected to extreme therapies in an attempt to palliate their symptoms. Psychiatrist Walter Freeman first introduced psychosurgery, in the form of frontal lobotomy, as an intervention that could offer some hope to those patients in whom all other treatments had failed. Since that time, however, the use of psychosurgery in the United States has waxed and waned significantly, though literature describing its use is relatively sparse. In an effort to contribute to a better understanding of the evolution of psychosurgery, the authors describe the history of psychosurgery in the state of Iowa and particularly at the University of Iowa Department of Neurosurgery. An interesting aspect of psychosurgery at the University of Iowa is that these procedures have been nearly continuously active since Freeman introduced the lobotomy in the 1930s. Frontal lobotomies and transorbital leukotomies were performed by physicians in the state mental health institutions as well as by neurosurgeons at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics (formerly known as the State University of Iowa Hospital). Though the early technique of frontal lobotomy quickly fell out of favor, the use of neurosurgery to treat select cases of intractable mental illness persisted as a collaborative treatment effort between psychiatrists and neurosurgeons at Iowa. Frontal lobotomies gave way to more targeted lesions such as anterior cingulotomies and to neuromodulation through deep brain stimulation. As knowledge of brain circuits and the pathophysiology underlying mental illness continues to grow, surgical intervention for psychiatric pathologies is likely to persist as a viable treatment option for select patients at the University of Iowa and in the larger medical community.

Download Full-text

Solitary Confinement across Borders

Solitary Confinement ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190947927.003.0004 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 59-76

Author(s):

Sharon Shalev

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

New Zealand ◽

The United States ◽

Prison System ◽

Solitary Confinement ◽

Management Units ◽

England And Wales ◽

Close Supervision ◽

Recent Developments

This chapter looks at the use of solitary confinement in three jurisdictions where the author has conducted research: England and Wales, New Zealand, and the United States. It asks when and why prisoners are placed in solitary confinement in these jurisdictions, and what are the conditions of their confinement. The chapter's main focus is on the long-term use of solitary confinement as a tool for managing individuals classified and labeled as the most dangerous or troublesome in the prison system, including in New Zealand's Management Units and England and Wales’s Close Supervision Centres. Finally, it examines recent developments and asks what learning there might be for other jurisdictions.

Download Full-text

Bibliotherapy for Mental Health

International Research in Higher Education ◽

10.5430/irhe.v2n2p67 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

pp. 67

Author(s):

Jennifer Yontz-Orlando

Keyword(s):

Mental Health ◽

United States ◽

Mental Illness ◽

Medical Condition ◽

Action Plan ◽

The United States ◽

World Health ◽

Group Setting ◽

Health Crisis ◽

The Uk

The United States is facing an epidemic of mental illness, affecting nearly 60 million Americans annually (http://www.nami.org/ ). The World Health Organization describes mental health as “a long neglected problem” and has established an action plan for 2013-2020 (http://www.who.int/mental_health/action_plan_2013/en/). One way to combat mental illness is through bibliotherapy, which is the use of written materials including fiction, nonfiction, and poetry to support emotional and psychiatric healing.Bibliotherapy has been in existence since ancient times, but began in earnest in the United States in the 1850’s during the “Great Awakening.” At that time, mental illness began to be seen as a medical condition rather than a supernatural phenomenon. Since then, due to the changing nature of our institutions, interest in bibliotherapy waned until the 1950’s when there was a slight resurgence in its practice. However, in the last 20 years, bibliotherapy has gained a stronghold in the United Kingdom. To relieve the stress of an overcrowded mental health system, public policy in the UK has supported the use of bibliotherapy in a variety of its institutions. There are many ways to conduct bibliotherapy, but studies show that when the process is interactive, such as in a support group setting, the results are better. Also, bibliotherapy can be conducted by many sorts of professionals, including doctors, therapists, social workers, teachers, and librarians. Studies also show that when the bibliotherapists are trained in the best practices of bibliotherapy, results improve. Bibliotherapy is an effective, low-cost alternative for people in need of therapeutic assistance. The UK model should be studied and implemented in the United States and in other nations to help solve the mental health crisis.

Download Full-text