A controversial unit for prisoners with mental illness at Vermont’s second-largest correctional facility is not currently being used.
Ed Adams, acting superintendent at Southern State Correctional Facility in Springfield, confirmed Friday that Alpha unit has been largely vacant since mid-September. Though rights advocates welcomed the decreased use of the unit, they are calling on the state to adopt permanent policy changes to discontinue the use of segregation on prisoners with mental illness.
One prisoner was temporarily held in Alpha since the unit was vacated, but that person had more freedom of movement than traditional in the unit — including time in the yard and interactions with others.
Alpha is a 10-bed mental health stabilization unit where prisoners with mental illness are held alone in cells for up to 23 hours a day. The unit, the only one of its kind in the state, has been the target of criticism from the Vermont Human Rights Commission, Disability Rights Vermont and others who say the practice is discriminatory and dangerous for prisoners with mental illness.
In one case that came before the Human Rights Commission, a young man with mental illness was held in segregation for 2½ years.
Adams said Southern State has reduced use of the unit to “virtually zero” through a combination of factors.
[For more of this story go to https://vtdigger.org/2016/11/2...amp;utm_medium=email]
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