Inmate in solitary for years raises red flags
Statistics show overuse of segregation in provincial jails, rights commission says
On a recent visit to a provincial jail in Thunder Bay, Renu Mandhane, Ontario’s chief human rights commissioner, asked a correctional officer if there was anything she should see.
The officer gave her the name of an inmate who had been in continuous segregation — or solitary confinement — for more than four years, awaiting trial.
For Mandhane, the inmate’s situation put a stark face to new provincial jail statistics, made public Tuesday by the Ontario Human Rights Commission, that show “alarming and systemic overuse of segregation,” the commission said in a news release.
In jails between October and December 2015, 4,178 individual inmates spent at least a day in segregation, according to an analysis by the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services.
Of those, 1,594 inmates, or 38.2 per cent, had a “mental health alert” on file, a proportion the commission believes underestimates mental health issues and disabilities.
Nearly a quarter of segregation placements exceeded two weeks. In the three months, the inmate with the longest continuous time in segregation in one setting had been there 939 days. Any transfer to another setting resets the clock.
As part of a provincial review of solitary confinement, the rights commission asked the ministry for segregation data. The ministry produced a report on a three-month period of its choosing, accompanied by a briefing and a host of caveats around the revealing analysis.
The analysis is part of submissions by the human rights commission that draw attention to what it calls “systemic reliance” and “overuse of segregation.” The submission also flags United Nations standards that find segregation longer than 15 days can be tantamount to “torture or other cruel inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”
The commission is calling on the government to collect and release segregation data annually and, based on what is known, “take immediate steps to address how its use of segregation is violating prisoners’ rights.” It is renewing a call to eliminate segregation.
The provincial review comes after a 2013 human rights settlement with the ministry. The new statistics, the commission said, raise concerns the ministry “is not complying with its obligations” in the settlement.
The commission released the jail data a day after the Ontario government announced it would cut by half the number of consecutive days inmates can spend in segregation for purely disciplinary reasons, to 15 from 30.
However, the vast majority of inmates placed in segregation are put there for non-disciplinary reasons, including protection of an inmate, medical reasons and alleged misconduct. According to the data released to the commission, only 4.3 per cent of inmate placements in segregation over the three months were disciplinary, and because of “misconduct of a serious nature.” About 68 per cent were deemed “administrative.”
The government also announced Monday it would hire an independent third party to help overhaul how segregation is used.
In the case of the Thunder Bay inmate, he has spent around 100 times longer in solitary than the UN’s limit, said Mandhane.
She didn’t identify him, but his name is Adam Capay, according to Toronto criminal defence lawyer Tony Bryant. Bryant told the Star he has been asked by Capay to represent him on a first-degree murder charge, and that Capay is currently lawyerless. Bryant said he’s seeking more information about the jail situation. Capay was charged in 2012 in connection with an altercation in a different jail, the Thunder Bay Correctional Centre, that left another inmate dead, according to news reports.
In an interview Tuesday, Mandhane said she asked for and received a tour of the Thunder Bay Jail on Oct. 7 and was approached by a cor- rectional officer.
The officer was concerned about a particular inmate in solitary, said Mandhane. During her tour, she said she was shown the segregation unit but his name wasn’t on the list of inmates there.
Eventually she asked her guides, who included the jail superintendent and an assistant deputy minister, if she could see him.
After getting his consent, Mandhane described being led down a flight of stairs to a windowless range that had a number of cells, including one at the end of the range with Plexiglas lining the outside of the cell.
That’s where she spoke with the inmate, who said the lights were on 24 hours a day. Through a small hole in the glass, she spoke to the inmate she described as a young indigenous man.
It is unclear on what charges he was imprisoned, but he told her he has been in continuous solitary confinement, awaiting trial, for more than four years, first at a jail in Kenora, then in the Thunder Bay jails.
“He told me that he had difficulty speaking as well as he used to because of the lack of human contact,” said Mandhane, and that because of the artificial light, he couldn’t tell day from night.
He also talked about self-harming incidents and showed related scars. He’d been restrained at least once and said he was visited by a psychiatrist about twice a month, but that the sessions were minutes long and that he felt the purpose of the visits were to “assess his suitability for continued segregation, and weren’t therapeutic in nature,” said Mandhane. Corrections officials did not explain to Mandhane why he was initially placed in segregation or the reason for his continued segregation, but confirmed he had been in for more than four years, she said.
Mandhane said the ministry later indicated there are issues with him being in the general population. “I don’t dispute that,” she said. “But I think there was also clear evidence of mental health issues. It’s not clear to me that he was really receiving any treatment.”
Rules require the jails to report to the ministry the reasons for continued segregation of an inmate. Where mental health is an issue, the ministry must consider alternatives.
The Star sought comment from the ministry. There was no immediate response Tuesday.