SOCIAL JUSTICE ACTIVIST GROUP, “RIGHTS FOR IMPRISONED PEOPLE WITH PSYCHIATRIC DISABILITIES” (RIPPD), ANGRILY “SHOUTS OUT” ABOUT THE USE OF SOLITARY CONFINEMENT (SHU) FOR INMATES WITH MENTAL ILLNESS

Contact: Lisa Ortega at 646-602-5664
September 17, 2004

In Harlem, on Friday, September 17, 2004, at Adam Clayton Powell State Office Building, 163 W. 125th Street at 12 Noon, RIPPD, a grassroots, social justice organization made up of former prisoners with mental illness and family members, supporters and the community at large will be out in full force “Shouting Out” about how cruel and inhumane the use of SHU is. The SHU is a Solitary Housing Unit which is a 12’ by 14’ cell that inmates are locked in 23 hours a day as a form of punishment. A replica of the SHU, with exact measurements of actual SHU dimensions, will be available. The mock SHU will allow people to step inside and experience the horrific feeling of being locked up in a SHU!

Members of RIPPD are outraged at the continued use of the SHU on prisoners with mental illness. For far too long, the Department of Correctional Services and the New York State Office of Mental Health have gotten away with unspeakable acts of neglect, abuse and torture of inmates that have already had their fair share of suffering, dealing with a mental illness. While the average disciplinary confinement sentence is 5 months, mentally ill prisoners are held in SHU for 38 months – seven times that of SHU prisoners generally. Increasingly, experts are documenting significant psychiatric deterioration, self- injury, delusions, manic activity, paranoia and high suicide rates among inmates with mental illness who are place in SHU.

“My son, who has a psychiatric disability, is currently in being held in SHU. Department of Correction puts people with mental illness in the SHU for little or nothing all it. Yelling or screaming can be cause for the use of SHU. They strip them of all dignity, give them bare walls to look at and lock them in the hell hole,” says Ellen Logan, member of RIPPD.

Jayette Lansbury, a member of RIPPD, angrily blames Commissioner of Correction, Glenn Goord. “We don’t know how Glenn Goord sleeps at night knowing that everyday people are being tortured in the SHU. It’s so easy for Commissioner Goord to talk about the need for SHU, sitting up on his high horse, but we would love to see him put his son or father in the SHU. Better yet, let’s see how tough his skin is – we dare him to sit 2 days in SHU!”