Saturday, May 11, 2013

13-05-12 Beyond GITMO - solitary confinement in the US



News: 

Russell "Maroon' Shoatz Files Lawsuit Protesting 22 Consecutive Years in Solitary Confinement 

Earlier this week, on Wednesday, May 8, lawyers for Russell "Maroon' Shoatz filed a federal lawsuit regarding his placement in solitary confinement for over 22 consecutive years. The written complaint, directed at Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Secretary John Wetzel and the Superintendents of SCI-Greene, where Shoatz was last held, and SCI-Mahanoy, where he was transferred to on March 28, 2013.

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And here is what American Friends Service Committee says:

Recent history of isolation

Beginning in the early 1970s, prison and jail administrators at the federal, state, and local level have relied increasingly on isolation and segregation to control men, women, and youth in their custody.
In 1985 there were a handful of control units across the county. Today an estimated 44 states have supermax facilities confining more than 30,000 people. Prisoners are often confined for months or even years, with some spending more than 25 years in segregated prison settings. As with the overall prison population, people of color are disproportionately represented in isolation units.
(AFSC's Justice Visions Briefing Paper, Prison Inside the Prison provides a more complete history.)
Complete AFSC report:
The "Angola Three" are the most notorious case of solitary confinement in the US today:

Angola Three

The Angola Three are three men, Robert Hillary King (born Robert King Wilkerson), Albert Woodfox and Herman Wallace, who were put in solitary confinement for decades in Angola PrisonLouisiana after the death of a prison guard.

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