The Punishment of Solitary Confinement

Yesterday, the New York Times ran an article entitled Two Decades in Solitary,  detailing the life of Willie Bosket, who was sentenced to 25 years to life after stabbing a prison guard. Bosket-- who was the impetus, 30 years ago, for New York's law permitting juveniles to be tried as adults (his first crime, at age 15, was killing two people, but he only served five years)--has spent the last 20 years in solitary confinement. 

As the Times notes:

He is one of New York’s most isolated prisoners, spending 23 hours a day for the past two decades in a 9-by-6-foot cell. The only trimmings are a cot and a sink-toilet combination. His visitors — few as they are — must wedge into a nook outside his cell and speak to him through a 1-by-3-foot window of foggy plexiglass and iron bars.

Bosket's repeated attempts to get the terms of his confinement lifted have so far proved unavailing.  But his case highlights the discussion now happening among both scholars and policy-makers:  whether the quality of punishment means as much as the quantity of punishment.  (Adam Kolber has recently written some excellent papers on this, found here.)  Clearly, permanent solitary confinement punishes in a way that even LWOP does not;  I'm glad the issue is getting some media and academic attention.

Comments

[matt]

If you go to the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia (certainly something everyone who goes to Philly w/ enough time should do!) you'll see that the original cells were all very small, made for one person who have very little contact with the outside spending nearly all of the time on his own. This was so that the person could think about his crimes and be penitent (hence the name of the building.) This practice didn't last long since, it seems, it had the primary effect of driving the prisoners crazy. Obviously the safety of the other prisoners and the staff of the prison should be very serious concerns, and neither ought to be exposed to seriously dangerous prisoners. But also obviously we ought to think more clearly about what solitary confinement does to people as well.