‘Eye Opening’ Self-Harm Found in Washington DOC Solitary Confinement
A report released in September 2024 by the Washington Corrections Ombuds found that incidence of self-harm was particularly high among state Department of Corrections (DOC) prisoners held in solitary confinement. The report was the second by the Ombuds Office since state lawmakers ended the use of “disciplinary segregation” in the DOC in 2021.
That did not end solitary confinement in Washington prisons, however; by March 2022, there were still some 600 prisoners held in isolation, as PLN reported. [See: PLN, July 2022, p.36.] As study co-author E.V. Webb noted, “There’s lots of reasons that people would be in solitary confinement”—trans prisoners waiting on a housing assignment, for example—”that don’t necessarily match what I think the public thinks of.”
The earlier Ombuds Office report released in June 2024 catalogued all the ways prisoners can be isolated, including Intensive Management Units (IMUs), Administrative Segregation (AdSeg) Units and Close Observation Areas (COAs). Together, these units had over 1,000 beds in state prisons, where some 3,000 prisoners were held in isolation between 2014 and 2023, either for more than 45 days at a time or more than four months in total. See: Solitary Confinement: Part I, Wash. Dep’t of Corr. Off. of Ombuds (June 2024).
In Part 2, Ombuds researchers looked at what happened to prisoners while held in isolation. They often suffered sensory deprivation and were denied access to “quality of life” services, such as healthcare and phone calls. Moreover, guards used “devices and tactics” to gain compliance that researchers called “dehumanizing and traumatizing”—especially because those in isolation were forced to rely on “staff interactions” as their source of “social engagement.” But communication was called “inconsistent,” as was the application of rules and sanctions, leading to “indeterminate stays” in segregation and “subjective use of restraint devices.”
The top takeaway: There were 14 deaths by suicide in DOC segregation units, a rate of almost 467 per 100,000—dwarfing the United States average of 14.2, as estimated by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2022. On top of that were another 176 suicide attempts, an amount of self-harm that Webb called “eye-opening.”
“There were a few surprises,” agreed another co-author, Angee Schrader. She was unfamiliar with two devices: a “Band-It” strap that guards trigger remotely to administer electronic shocks and a riot shield that also has shock capability. Ultimately, she concluded, “Putting people into a room by themselves and stripping them of everything, including their dignity, is not going to help them successfully reenter into our communities.”
Other findings were sadly less surprising, such as reports that showers were provided to prisoners in isolation only three times a week. The shower nozzle was operated by a push button so the water was never on more than a few seconds at a time. “For several people, toilet paper was only given out a few nights per week,” the study also recalled. “If they ran out, people would have to wait for an emergency roll when staff got around to it.”
Then-Secretary Cheryl Strange announced in January 2023 that the DOC was aiming for a 90% reduction in the use of solitary confinement by 2028. But that goal may not be reached, Deputy Secretary Sean Murphy allowed, since the agency received only “about an eighth of the funding that we requested.” As of early February 2025, newly installed Secretary Tim Lang had not commented on the report. See: See: Solitary Confinement: Part II, Wash. Dep’t of Corr. Off. of Ombuds (Sep. 2024).
Additional source: KING
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