Halt this prison torture
Gov. Andrew Cuomo has a choice to make in the next few days, between whether he allows the continued torture of human beings in New York’s custody, or takes steps to put an end to it.
One would think this would be an easy call for the governor. If history is any indication, though, it is not.
Sitting on Mr. Cuomo’s desk is the Humane Alternatives to Long-term Confinement Act, which would end the excessive use of solitary confinement in New York prisons. While isolation may be necessary for short stretches in certain instances to protect an inmate or those around him, the United Nations says it amounts to torture once it goes past 15 days.
In New York, however, solitary confinement, used mainly as a disciplinary and punitive tool, can last months, even years, leaving people with mental and emotional scars under the dubious guise of improving their behavior.
The state Legislature has talked since at least 2013 about curtailing this inhumane, antiquated, counterleased,
productive practice, only to be met with resistance from the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, and ultimately from Mr. Cuomo. In persuading lawmakers not to impose limits on the use of solitary, DOCCS said it would voluntarily and even dramatically reduce the use of it.
A 2019 study by the New York Civil Liberties Union, however, found that the state’s use of solitary confinement, under the euphemistic term “keeplock,” actually increased, with hundreds more prisoners confined to cells for 23 hours a day.
DOCCS has also objected to limiting solitary confinement to 15 days, saying instead that it would prefer to phase in a 30-day maximum over a period of years — still twice the UN definition of torture. As of 2019 when the NYCLU report was rethe average was 100 days.
There are better things the state could do in its prisons than throw people into isolation. One would be expanding the opportunity for them to get more education by restoring their ability to apply for college financial aid through New York’s Tuition Assistance Program. Both the state and federal government eliminated college aid for inmates in the 1990s in tough-on-crime initiatives that ignored the connection between poverty, poor education, and crime. Congress recently restored prisoners’ eligibility for Pell grants; New York should do the same with TAP.
It could easily pay the tab — estimated at $5 million a year — by reforming solitary, a costly practice that, if reformed, would save state and local governments $1.3 billion over a decade, according to an analysis by the Partnership for Public Good, a Buffalo think tank.
New York’s prison system has had long enough to reform this practice. HALT could be one of the most significant criminal justice reforms enacted this legislative session. Mr. Cuomo should sign it. In 2021, New York should no longer be debating how much torture is acceptable.