WHPTV
Pa. — The Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania (DRN) filed a federal lawsuit today challenging the unconstitutional treatment of prisoners with serious mental illness in solitary confinement, known as Restricted Housing Units, in state correctional institutions.
The network, designated under federal law to protect the rights of people with disabilities, said the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections confines about 800 men and women with mental illnesses in horrific conditions with inadequate mental health treatment.
The lawsuit alleges that the department is aware that such confinement exacerbates their mental illness, but does not adequately take their mental health into account before disciplining them by placing them in solitary confinement for extended periods of time. The lawsuit alleges the state’s mistreatment of these prisoners, who make up about 33% of the total RHU population, violates their rights under the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Prisoners in RHUs are locked down at least 23 hours a day in cells as small as 80 square feet – the size of an average home bathroom. Often prisoners are punished for violations of prison rules that are a result of the symptoms and manifestations of their mental illness.
Full story: Group suing prisons over treatment of mentally ill