Indiana Department of Correction agrees to end solitary for mentally ill

“The Indiana Department of Correction has made extraordinary efforts to address the treatment of severely mentally ill prisoners in its care,” Ken Falk, ACLU of Indiana legal director, said in a statement. “The DOC has increased both correctional staffing and mental health staffing and is largely already in compliance with the settlement agreement.

“We fully anticipate this cooperation will continue and that these changes will have a significant positive impact by reducing the severity of mental illness in prisoners who will one day rejoin society.”

Severe mental illness, as outlined by the settlement, applies to any inmate whose mental capacities deteriorated while being held in restrictive housing, also known as solitary confinement.

The agreement also stipulates that the DOC must provide “minimum adequate treatment” including an individualized treatment plan, therapeutic programming, recreational time, showers, additional therapy and “out-of-cell” time.

According to court documents, the DOC “continues to deny that it has at any time violated the Eight Amendment rights” of those held in solitary, but wishes to reach an agreement with the ACLU and its plaintiffs. The DOC has also opened a mental health treatment center at the Pendleton Correctional Facility since 2012 and taken other steps to address the mental health of its inmates at other DOC facilities.

“As a result of this litigation, prisoners with mental illness have more opportunities for treatment than ever before,” Dawn Adams, executive director of IPAS, one of the lawsuit’s plaintiffs, said in a statement last month.

According to Adams, more than 5,600 DOC prisoners suffer from some form of mental illness.

“IPAS will remain actively engaged in the work of protecting the rights of people with mental illness by monitoring the changes at IDOC facilities,” she continued. “This case, once again, underscores the importance of access to care for people with mental illness and highlights the need for reform in our mental health system.”

The lawsuit began in 2008, when three DOC prisoners and the IPASC filed a class-action against the DOC stating in part that “a significant number of prisoners committed to the care and custody of the Indiana DOC have serious mental illnesses that significantly impede their ability to function within the prison environment” and requested an end to holding these prisoners in “segregation or excessively isolated and harsh conditions.”

The suit alleges that the DOC’s inability to treat such prisoners “in non-segregated and therapeutic environments violates the Eight Amendment.”

In 2012, Judge Tanya Walton Pratt of the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Indiana ruled in favor of the ACLU and its plaintiffs.

The two parties later worked to reach an agreement, which was filed in the United States District Court, Southern District of Indiana on January 27.

But the DOC will reserve the right to detain some mentally ill inmates in solitary, also referred to as restrictive and protective housing.

According to court documents, “the parties acknowledge that there may be exceptional circumstances where barring or removing a seriously mentally ill prisoner from segregation/restrictive housing would pose an unacceptable risk to the safety and security of one or more prisoners and/or the staff.”

The settlement continues that in such circumstances, the superintendent of the facility and a mental health professional must approve the confinement of such an individual and that the detainment must be reviewed every 14 days.

The settlement is awaiting final approval of the U.S. District Court.