President Obama on Monday ordered the Bureau of Prisons to halt the use of solitary confinement for juvenile offenders and low-level offenders, calling the practice overused and psychologically devastating.
"Research suggests that solitary confinement has the potential to lead to devastating, lasting psychological consequences. It has been linked to depression, alienation, withdrawal, a reduced ability to interact with others and the potential for violent behavior. Some studies indicate that it can worsen existing mental illnesses and even trigger new ones. Prisoners in solitary are more likely to commit suicide, especially juveniles and people with mental illnesses," Obama wrote in an op-ed in The Washington Post explaining his decision to adopt the Justice Department's recommendations to reform the federal prison system.
He continued: "The United States is a nation of second chances, but the experience of solitary confinement too often undercuts that second chance. Those who do make it out often have trouble holding down jobs, reuniting with family and becoming productive members of society. Imagine having served your time and then being unable to hand change over to a customer or look your wife in the eye or hug your children."
Solitary confinement should "be limited, applied with constraints and used only as a measure of last resort," such as when an inmate poses a threat to staff or to himself, Obama said.
Along with reforming solitary confinement practices, the president said he would also be increasing the amount of time inmates in solitary confinement can spend outside of their cell and expanding treatment for mentally ill prisoners. Some mentally ill inmates will be diverted to alternative forms of housing and the use of "punitive segregation" will be limited, according to NBC News.
"These steps will affect some 10,000 federal prisoners held in solitary confinement - and hopefully serve as a model for state and local corrections systems," Obama wrote. "And I will direct all relevant federal agencies to review these principles and report back to me with a plan to address their use of solitary confinement."
Some 8,625 federal prisoners, or about 5 percent of the total federal prison population, were in solitary confinement as of last November, and more than 1,071 of them were in a cell by themselves for more than 90 days, according to USA Today.
The impact of the ban on juvenile solitary confinement will be minimal because only 71 people under the age of 18 are currently held in federal prison, and as of last September, only 13 had been housed in solitary confinement during the past year, usually for a brief period of time.
Obama's executive actions come six months after he ordered the Justice Department to study solitary confinement at the federal Bureau of Prisons. The investigation found that the number of U.S. prisoners in solitary confinement has dropped by 25 percent since 2012, and officials recommended that the practice still be used for the "most violent and disruptive inmates."
"But as a matter of policy, we believe strongly this practice should be used rarely, applied fairly, and subjected to reasonable constraints," the DOJ said.
