By John Monk
The State
COLUMBIA, SC — Bryan Stirling, acting state prisons director, proposed Thursday that the appeals process of a court decision that found grossly substandard conditions in the S.C. Department of Corrections be halted.
While the appeal is halted, the plaintiffs in the lawsuit and Corrections could mediate the various matters in the lawsuit using Tom Stephenson as the mediator.
“I believe that working together we can make great progress without the need for continued litigation,” Stirling wrote in a letter to lawyers Stuart Andrews and Daniel Westbrook, who represent the interests of the mentally ill in state prisons.
In an interview later, Andrews indicated the plaintiffs will respond to Stirling’s overture, saying only “We look forward to discussing with the department opportunities to improve the services to inmates in a way consistent with the judge’s findings.
In early January, state Judge Michael Baxley in a historic decision ruled that treatment given S.C. prison inmates suffering serious mental illness is so substandard that it’s unconstitutional and threatens the mental health of inmates.
Evidence in this case has proved that inmates have died in the S.C. Department of Corrections for lack of basic mental health care,” Baxley wrote in his 45-page order.
“Hundreds more remain substantially at risk for serious physical injury, mental decompensation, and profound, permanent mental illness,” wrote Baxley . He cited numerous individual cases as evidence of “a system that is inherently flawed in many respects, understaffed, underfunded and inadequate.”
Baxley , 57, of Hartsville, called the lawsuit “the most troubling” of the 70,000 cases he has handled in his 14 years on the bench because evidence showed that for more than 10 years, the department knew is mental illness programs expose “seriously mentally ill inmates to a substantial risk of serious harm.”
He gave the department – the main defendant in the case – 180 days to prepare a plan to remedy the situation.
Within a day of Baxley’s decision, the department announced it would appeal. No appeal has yet been filed.
Stirling made his letter public during a Thursday morning meeting of the Senate Corrections and Penology Committee.
At that meeting, the committee without dissent voted to recommend Stirling nomination to be Corrections permanent director be forwarded to the Senate.
The meeting was also remarkable because, although committee chair Sen. Mike Fair, R-Greenville, specifically requested senators not to ask Stirling about the mental illness lawsuit, freshman Sen. Marlon Kimpson, cordially disobeyed Fair.
Kimpson told Fair he had a right on behalf of his constituents to question Stirling about how the department treats mentally ill prisoners.
When Fair again asked senators not to discuss the mental illness issue, Kimpson told Fair that a judge had already ruled in the case and issue a 45-page statement of findings.
Stirling, saying he did not mind, answered Kimpson’s questions.