Pennsylvania Solitary Unit Pushes People to Suicide, Lawsuit Alleges
Within months of entering the Security Threat Group Management Unit at SCI Fayette, one man says he smeared, “Kill me, I’m ready to go,” on the cell in his own blood.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Oct 03, 2023
The Two Months I Didn’t Eat: Inside the Longest Prison Hunger Strike in California History
Ten years ago this month, nearly 29,000 people in California prisons staged a hunger strike to protest solitary confinement.
Brian Quintanilla Jul 25, 2023
I Spent Over a Year in Solitary Because of One Man’s Imagination
The conditions I faced were outrageous. But the prison administration’s justification for keeping me in the hole was even worse.
Kevin Light-Roth Jul 13, 2023
Solitary By Another Name: How New York Prisons Are Using ‘Therapeutic’ Units to Evade Reform
New York’s landmark solitary confinement reform law created a new, “rehabilitative” type of isolation unit. State prisons aren’t on board with the changes.
Chris Gelardi Oct 05, 2022
‘Reborn Into A Strange New World’: A Trans Woman Prepares For Release After 18 Years In Men’s Prison
An incarcerated writer reflects on what her “going home” story will look like when home no longer exists.
Jessica Phoenix Sylvia Apr 28, 2022
“It’s like a slow war, like a slow burn. Like a slow, quiet form of torture.”
Thank you for all of your support. Your contributions have enabled us to turn The Appeal into a worker-led newsroom dedicated to exposing the harms of the criminal legal system — and to begin publishing again! Check out some of our recent pieces: We uncovered a robbery task force at DC’s Metropolitan Police Department that […]
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Dec 14, 2021
A Virginia Prison Held A Man In Solitary Confinement For Over 600 Days
Virginia’s Department of Corrections has recently settled two lawsuits over its use of solitary confinement—a practice lawmakers are moving closer to abolishing.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Feb 05, 2021
Advocates Hope New Momentum Around Racial Justice Will Accelerate New York’s Plans To Limit Solitary Confinement
A year after state officials said they would take steps to overhaul solitary confinement rules, prisoners remain isolated in conditions that one says is akin to being ‘buried alive.’
Victoria Law Jul 20, 2020
In the Middle of a Pandemic, Prisoners at San Quentin Are Punished for Being Sick
Prisoners are reluctant to report when they’re feeling sick, because they know they’ll be sent to solitary confinement.
Juan Moreno Haines Jun 23, 2020
As Use of Solitary Confinement Surges, Advocates Call for Releasing Prisoners
Legal, medical, and religious groups warn in a new report that the widespread use of solitary confinement in response to COVID-19 risks spreading the disease further and undoing a decade of progress.
Joshua Manson Jun 19, 2020
Still in Solitary
Five years after statewide hunger strikes and a landmark settlement, men incarcerated in a California prison say they’re still isolated for up to 22 hours a day.
Joshua Manson May 21, 2020
Prisoners Who Test Positive For COVID-19 In Connecticut Are Sent To A Notorious Maximum Security Prison
Faculty members of the Yale School of Public Health, the Yale School of Medicine, and the Yale School of Nursing wrote to the governor that sending patients there is “inhumane and ineffective.”
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg May 08, 2020
History Teaches Us That When Viruses Come to Prisons, Punishment Is Not the Answer
The H1N1 pandemic, the HIV/AIDS crisis, and other outbreaks have taught us that blanket policies of solitary confinement and isolation have led to harmful outcomes.
Joshua Manson Mar 23, 2020
Coronavirus: We’re Urged To Wash Our Hands, But For Some It’s Not That Simple
Public health recommendations aren’t easy to follow for the incarcerated, unhoused, or the thousands who’ve been subjected to water shutoffs in recent years.
Vaidya Gullapalli Mar 11, 2020
In San Quentin Prison, Getting The Flu Can Land You In Solitary Confinement
Prisoners avoid admitting they are sick because they don’t want to be put in solitary, so nurses go cell to cell to take their temperatures.
Juan Moreno Haines Feb 20, 2020
Collective Punishment At A Massachusetts Prison
A culture of violence and resistance to reform in the corrections department set the stage for a recent lockdown
Vaidya Gullapalli Feb 20, 2020
Speaking Out About Prison Conditions Is Risky. Incarcerated People Do It Anyway.
Even when retaliation is likely, people speak out about the violence and abuse they experience and witness.
Vaidya Gullapalli Nov 15, 2019
Presidential Candidate Pete Buttigieg Releases Criminal Justice Reform Plan
The South Bend, Indiana, mayor says his plan—which includes cutting the incarcerated population by half—will “rebalance” a system that is “unfair and racist in many ways.”
Aaron Morrison Oct 26, 2019
U.S. Prisoners on Death Row Endure Permanent Solitary Confinement Before Execution
With Appeal staff reporter Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg
Adam H. Johnson Oct 03, 2019
Oklahoma Department of Corrections Agrees to Move ‘Qualifying’ Death Row Prisoners Out of Tomblike Unit
Some death row prisoners will be moved to another unit with access to direct sunlight, fenced-in recreation, and contact visits, department says.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Sep 28, 2019
Oklahoma’s Death Row Prisoners Are Forced Into Permanent Solitary Confinement. They are ‘Buried Alive,’ Advocates Say.
Civil rights groups demand change as other states move away from the practice of isolating people sentenced to death.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg Sep 25, 2019
When Americans Are Silent Spectators
The intense interest in conditions at MCC after Jeffrey Epstein’s death was preceded by years when little was done to address restrictions so oppressive one observer described them as “diabolical.” Why do Americans allow brutality, even torture, to go unchecked?
Vaidya Gullapalli Aug 26, 2019
Spotlight: Supporting Solitary for Manafort Means Supporting It for Everyone
Yesterday the news broke that Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign head who was sentenced to seven and a half years in prison on federal charges, will now face criminal charges in state court in Manhattan. The New York Times reports that Manafort will most likely be held at Rikers Island, segregated from the general population. […]
Vaidya Gullapalli Jun 05, 2019
Indefinite Solitary Confinement in New York Is Finally Put to the Test
Court challenges and a sweeping reform bill are offering hope to men trapped in isolation for decades.
Joshua Manson Jun 03, 2019
Solitary is a ‘Tomb’ With No Escape, Virginia Prisoners Allege
A new lawsuit, filed against the Virginia Department of Corrections, says prisoners are kept in isolation for frivolous reasons and prevented from rejoining the general population.
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg May 06, 2019
In 1 Day, New Mexico Prison Had 2 Suicides In Solitary Confinement
The state uses solitary at one of the highest rates in the nation.
Kira Lerner Jan 29, 2019
A Prison Strike in Minnesota Actually Got Results
Most prison strikes are met with retaliation and abuse, but one recent work stoppage is starting to pay off.
Raven Rakia Jan 25, 2019
Solitary Confinement, Jail Deaths Rock Race For Sheriff in California
In Santa Clara County, incarcerated people, and a former undersheriff challenging six-term sheriff Laurie Smith, have turned conditions of confinement into a potent electoral issue.
Victoria Law Oct 29, 2018
As National Prison Strike Continues, Incarcerated People Face Retaliation
Now in its second week, a strike staged by prisoners over poor conditions, low wages, and other issues is resulting in consequences, including harsh conduct reports and placements in solitary confinement.
Raven Rakia Aug 31, 2018
A Troubled Federal Prison Unit Gets New Life In A Different State
Instead of changing its conditions and practices, The Bureau of Prisons is simply moving a problem-plagued federal prison unit in Pennsylvania to Illinois.
Victoria Law Aug 21, 2018
Immigrants Share Horror Stories From Inside Massachusetts’s ‘Worst’ Jail
“Jail is not a country club,” the Bristol County sheriff said. “That’s why once you’ve done time in the Bristol County House of Corrections, you won’t want to come back.”
Eoin Higgins Jul 17, 2018
What Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court Would Mean for Criminal Justice
Trump’s pick to replace Justice Kennedy would most likely undermine the rights of criminal defendants and stall progress on solitary confinement, prisoners’ rights, and the death penalty.
Kyle C. Barry Jul 13, 2018
Bill Challenging ‘Safekeeping’ of Tennessee Teens in Adult Prisons Could Soon Become Law
On Wednesday, May 16, 16-year-old Rosalyn “Bird” Holmes was able to walk out of prison and hug her mother. Though the teenager has yet to be indicted, let alone convicted, of any crime, she nonetheless spent the past 40 days in the Tennessee State Penitentiary, an adult women’s prison in Henning, Tennessee. Had it not […]
Victoria Law May 18, 2018
Over 100 Pennsylvania Prisoners are Held in Solitary Confinement — With No End in Sight
Russell Maroon Shoatz says that for 22 years straight he couldn’t sleep for more than three or four hours a night. The restricted housing unit where he lived — a solitary confinement cell, in common parlance — was smaller than most horse stalls, perpetually lit, and often cold during Pennsylvania’s long winters. Another Pennsylvania prisoner, Andre Jacobs, […]
Maura Ewing, Matt Stroud Feb 21, 2018
How ‘El Chapo’s’ Attorney is Fighting For His Client’s Right to a Fair Trial
Each day in his small cell in a Manhattan federal prison, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera battles severe headaches and vomiting, his lawyer says. He spends several hours with members of his defense team, reviewing 300,000 pages of discovery to prepare for his upcoming trial on charges including “leading a continuing criminal enterprise,” drug distribution, use of firearms, and […]
Lauren Gill Feb 20, 2018
Tennessee Sheriff: Solitary Confinement for 16 year-old Girl is No Different Than a ‘Private Room’
A 16-year-old Memphis girl charged with first-degree murder in the killing of a teen boy is being held in pretrial isolation at the Tennessee Prison for Women in Nashville. The Shelby County District Attorney’s office charged her as an adult in the April 3, 2017 shooting death of 17-year-old Deago Brown. She was just 15 […]
Meaghan Ybos Feb 13, 2018
Pennsylvania’s Death Row Prisoners Argue That the Right to Execute Does Not Include the Right to Isolate
Historically, whenever a Pennsylvania court handed down a death sentence, it was effectively condemning the defendant to live the rest of his or her years in isolation. The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections mandates that people on death row be held in solitary confinement. And Pennsylvania isn’t the only state to do so: A recent survey by The Marshall […]
Maura Ewing Jan 31, 2018
Washington’s Largest County Bans Solitary Confinement For Kids in Adult Jails
Last week, councilmembers in Washington State’s largest county unanimously passed a bill that eliminates solitary confinement for youth detained in adult correctional facilities. In doing so, they joined a growing group of lawmakers across the country taking a stance against a practice that has disastrous effects on kids and teenagers tangled up in the criminal justice […]
Carimah Townes Dec 20, 2017
Why is the Bronx District Attorney holding Pedro Hernandez at Rikers Island?
Pedro Hernandez, an 18-year-old man man from the Bronx, has been locked up on Rikers Island waiting for trial for almost two years. He has no prior criminal convictions and is fighting two cases, a 2015 shooting and an unrelated robbery, both of which appear to rest on flimsy evidence.
Nick Encalada-Malinowski Jul 24, 2017