Releasing elderly inmates en masse is misguided
While some older offenders may have access to adequate housing, others may have nowhere safe to go
Most prisoners will eventually be released back into the community. Some are quite elderly and face many challenges finding appropriate housing in normal times. During a pandemic, securing housing is exceptionally hard. Yet across Canada, prison reform activists are calling for the immediate and sweeping release of elderly inmates, including those with dementia and other age-related health conditions.
While sensible in some cases, this move may be ill-advised in many others.
It is true that elderly prisoners in general pose little risk to public safety; many are unlikely to reoffend. However, this is only part of the equation. The decision to release should also consider the risk society poses to elderly parolees.
While some older offenders may have access to adequate housing, others may have nowhere safe to go. As Leonard Cohen wrote, “There is no decent place to stand in a massacre.”
Like prisons, other congregate settings such as halfway houses and homeless shelters are vulnerable to COVID-19 outbreaks, especially those located in poor and densely populated neighbourhoods, where social distancing is nearly impossible and where advocates continue to plead for medical supplies.
There is also limited bed availability. According to Canada’s Correctional Investigator, there is a shortage of accessible beds in halfway houses for offenders who require specialized health services, including dementia care.
Furthermore, some homeless shelters have closed for the warmer months. Others have shut their doors due to COVID-19. Many that remain open have reported cases of the coronavirus.
Long-term-care homes have been the worst hit by COVID-19. The current public health crisis is adding stress to a nursing home system already burdened by bed and staff shortages. There is also an inadequate supply of personal protective equipment for both workers and residents.
The situation is so dire in Ontario and Quebec homes that the military has been brought in to assist.
Some elderly inmates have well-meaning families who are willing to house them; however, these placements can be unsuitable. Loved ones may be illequipped to manage an older parolee’s physical and mental health care needs. This may be particularly so for offenders with dementia who are experiencing the disease’s behavioural symptoms, such as repetitive behaviours, agitation and aggression.
In some cases, the family home environment can expose an older parolee to elder abuse and neglect. This may be especially so when there has been intergenerational violence. Households may also be small and crowded, creating challenges for physical distancing. Parolees
with dementia may be especially at risk of contracting the virus if they wander, a common symptom of the disease.
Some parolees have no outside support network. Relatives and friends may have died from old age or distanced themselves from the offender. Given the health risks associated with prolonged isolation and loneliness, parolees who are thrust into the community with strangers and no sense of structure may find themselves feeling profoundly alone and unwell. For persons with dementia, a change in routine can trigger delirium.
Community supervision poses another challenge. Parole officers are overwhelmed with caseloads at the best of times; during a pandemic, the workload can become extremely difficult, especially with elderly parolees who may have multiple health issues.
Decarcerating the elderly inmate population en masse might seem like the humane and compassionate choice, especially given the harsh and unsanitary conditions in prisons across the country. However, it risks shuffling older prisoners from one risky place to another. It also reinforces the ageist assumption that all seniors are the same and thus overlooks individual circumstances that can make staying in prison the difficult yet proper choice.
So what to do? A sensible approach quickly considers each inmate’s situation on a case-by-case basis, assessing not only their risk to public safety but also society’s risk to them. If an offender’s risk to reoffend can be adequately managed in the community, and if they have appropriate support and safe housing outside of prison, they should be considered for release. If these conditions cannot be met, it may be more suitable to keep the inmate incarcerated.
Of course, it is also incumbent upon correctional services to do everything they can to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in their facilities, while respecting prisoners’ human rights and dignity. We have seen that some institutions are experiencing extensive outbreaks. These situations must be controlled to protect the lives of prisoners who are not released.
Heather Campbell Pope is founder of Dementia Justice Canada and a former member of Correctional Service Canada’s Older Offender Health Care Advisory Committee. Eddy Elmer is a PhD candidate at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and vice-chair of Correctional Service Canada’s Citizen Advisory Committee for Metro Vancouver West Community Corrections. The views are the authors’ own and not necessarily those of CSC or its committees.