The Misuse of Punishment
According to Keramet Reiter, a writer for TIME, it has been estimated that the average cost of a year in solitary costs taxpayers $75,000. Solitary confinement has been around for centuries. It is used as a form of punishment to isolate a prisoner from any interaction. However, over time the system has misused this form of punishment by leaving prisoners in solitude for months, even years. The system’s misuse of punishments keeps these prisoners locked up in a room the size of a parking space with nothing but a bed and a toilet every single day. Humans are meant to interact, move, and challenge their minds; it’s what keeps us sane. Utilizing creative engagement as an experiential intervention is a useful approach to inform an audience that might be struggling with understanding solitary confinement. A creative method captivates a moment and in time a potential change.
In an interview, Kevin Wong recalled an incident where he was sent to solitary confinement. He said, “I was being targeted for a theft while awaiting my trial. The result of which ended up with both my aggressor, and myself taking ambulances to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital before being sent to lockup (solitary confinement) upon our respective returns to Middlesex County Adult Correctional Facility.” Mr. Wong was fortunate enough to be punished for only a few days. However, many prisoners don’t get the same treatment and can be left in solitary for many days, months, and even years. In 2015 Brian Amaral wrote an article for Nj.com. He stated, “For more than a year and a half, one inmate in Middlesex County jail’s C-pod hasn’t breathed fresh air or seen natural sunlight. They’re in their cells 23 hours a day five days a week, and 24 hours a day the other two. Even when they’re allowed outside of the cell, they can’t speak to other inmates. And now, nine of those inmates are suing the county in federal court, arguing that the dark and unforgiving life in C-pod of the Middlesex County Adult Corrections Center violates their Constitutional rights (Amaral 2015)”.
According to an article called, Solitary Confinement and Mental Illness in U.S. Prisons: A Challenge for Medical Ethics by Jeffrey L. Metzner and Jamie Fellner from Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law Online, “The use of segregation to confine the mentally ill has grown as the number and proportion of prisoners with mental illness have grown. Although designed and operated as places of punishment, prisons have nonetheless become de facto psychiatric facilities despite often lacking the needed mental health services.” The article also stated, “studies and clinical experience consistently indicate that 8 to 19 percent of prisoners have psychiatric disorders that result in significant functional disabilities, and another 15 to 20 percent require some form of psychiatric intervention during their incarceration. Sixty percent of state correctional systems responding to a survey on inmate mental health reported that 15 percent or more of their inmate population had a diagnosed mental illness.”
Factual evidence has been found that inmates suffering from mental disorders are being placed under conditions that worsen their health as opposed to helping them. People need to realize that solitary confinement only hurts a person’s recovery to bettering themselves. To demonstrate the solitude experienced in prison, on April 12th, I presented my tri-fold at the “Life, Death, Life Again: Children Sentenced to Die in Prison” performance event in Highland Park. Members of the audience found the idea to be clever and really seemed to understand the concept, while others glanced in confusion. Even though not all audience members understood the concept, the experience would last in their memory do to the idea of creative engagement.
