Lockdowns and Segregation - Correctional Slacking
- Kelly Gates
- Oct 27, 2017
- 2 min read
The Toronto Star recently published an article on the status of Segregation in correctional facilities (https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2017/10/25/ending-segregation-a-fitting-legacy-for-ashley-smith.html). It very clearly marks the lack of progress made in the past 10 years on the eventual goal of abolishing segregation. Bringing these issues to the forefront is extremely important, as all too many get too comfortable ignoring the correctional world and leaving its issues behind closed doors, as it were.
The author of the article, Breese Davies, puts it very well, when she writes:
"In the decade since Ashley’s death, we have seen tremendous change in the outside world. But in the sluggish, security-obsessed world of prison administration little had changed. Calls for reform continue to be ignored. Reports on Ashley’s death that urged change have been shelved, including reports from Canada’s correctional investigator. And the jury’s recommendations are yet to be implemented. On the 10-year anniversary of her death, we owe it to Ashley to highlight the lapsed promise of those recommendations."
In addition to the issue of segregation, the number of lockdown days and how that impacts visits should also be discussed and regulated. Lockdowns were brought to the forefront after class action suits were filed against the Ontario government for the deplorable conditions of the jails. See this article from Toronto Life published earlier this year: https://torontolife.com/city/inside-toronto-south-detention-centre-torontos-1-billion-hellhole/
The anecdotal information I've gathered from different inmates suggests that often a lockdown lasts from Friday evening to Monday morning. When a detention centre is on lockdown, the inmates are confined to their cells for the duration of the lockdown. The cells are also not very large. They are probably half the size of most living rooms. Sometimes there are three inmates to a cell that is meant to house two inmates, forcing one to sleep on the floor.
If lockdowns are going to be used, they should only be used in situations where there is concern for the safety of the staff or the inmates. The lockdown should be lifted as soon as as safety is no longer an issue. But the reality is that detention centres are very frequently locked down due to staff shortages. If shortage of staff is a problem, efforts should be made to hire more correctional officers.
Lockdowns also affect visits. It seems like the detention centers have since changed their policies on how it affects professional/lawyer visits. However, they have not changed how that impacts visits from family and friends. Often family members who try to visit people in custody arrive in the jail and are then told the facility is on lockdown. As a result of that, the visits have been cancelled. Some people have to travel quite a distance to the detention centres. When they voice these concerns, their situations are addressed with "you should have called before you left".
Whether it's lockdowns or segregation, these practices of "inmate management" have to be curtailed. They are, quite frankly, tools used because no one wants to come up with a better solution. Although I imagine the solution will have a number of complexities, confining people to their cells every time someone calls in sick is very clearly not the way to go.
Comments