{"id":306676,"date":"2021-07-23T18:42:11","date_gmt":"2021-07-23T15:42:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/ending-solitary-confinement-in-canadas-prisons-take-2\/"},"modified":"2021-07-23T18:42:11","modified_gmt":"2021-07-23T15:42:11","slug":"ending-solitary-confinement-in-canadas-prisons-take-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ending-solitary-confinement-in-canadas-prisons-take-2\/","title":{"rendered":"#Ending solitary confinement in Canada’s prisons, take 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Ending solitary confinement in Canada’s prisons, take 2<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Justin Ling: Ottawa is reapp<\/a>ointing an expert panel\u2014disbanded a year ago because it couldn’t do its work\u2014to study the unconstitutional use of solitary confinement in prisons\n <\/div>\n
\n The Trudeau government is reappointing a panel of experts to study the use of solitary confinement in federal prisons, nearly a year after the panel disbanded\u2014unable to do its work.<\/span><\/p>\n

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair is vowing that, this time, the Structured Intervention Unit Implementation Advisory Panel will be able to do properly study the issue, and ensure Canada\u2019s prisons aren\u2019t violating inmates\u2019 constitutional rights.<\/span><\/p>\n

On Friday, Blair\u2019s office announced it has appointed longtime prison watchdog Howard Sapers to lead the new panel, supported by former chair of the panel, criminologist Anthony Doob, and supported with staff and resources from Public Safety Canada.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI will continue to work with the CSC Commissioner to ensure that the renewed panel will have the information, resources, and time necessary to fulfill its mandate,\u201d Blair said in a statement.<\/span><\/p>\n

Courts in Ontario and British Columbia found that Canadian prisons systematically employed solitary confinement, in violation of Canadians\u2019 Charter rights.<\/p>\n

After spending years fighting those challenges in court, the Trudeau government conceded, and vowed to end the use of solitary confinement altogether. It introduced legislation to replace the practise with Structured Intervention Units, designed to provide inmates with more supports and more time outside their cells.<\/span><\/p>\n

When it was originally appointed, in the summer of 2019, the panel was asked to ensure that solitary confinement\u2014placing inmates in cells, without meaningful human contact or time outside, for 22 hours a day or more for prolonged periods of time\u2014had truly been ended.<\/span><\/p>\n

The government appointed the advisory panel, led by Doob, to monitor the implementation of the new units.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the volunteer panel <\/span>disbanded in August 2020<\/span><\/a>, without being able to answer whether these new units were truly any better than solitary confinement. It blasted Correctional Service Canada for blocking the effort to study the problem.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

After <\/span>VICE News published the leaked report<\/span><\/a>, Blair promised he would reboot the panel and help it get the necessary information in a \u201ctimely manner.\u201d That was last August. The panel has not existed since then\u2014even amid waves of COVID-19 outbreaks inside federal prisons that saw inmates locked in their cells for upwards of 23 hours a day for weeks and months on end.<\/span><\/p>\n

As <\/span>Maclean\u2019s<\/span><\/i> reported last September, a major barrier to his work is that the <\/span>prison agency was simply not collecting or studying the relevant data<\/span> on the use of solitary confinement or Structured Intervention Units.<\/span><\/p>\n

While the panel hasn\u2019t existed since last year, Doob has continued his effort regardless\u2014with some cooperation from the Correctional Service.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the past year, Doob has released three reports on the use of solitary confinement in federal prisons. He has found, using the Service\u2019s own data, that <\/span>one-in-10 inmates<\/span><\/a> placed in these Structured Intervention Units met an internationally-recognized definition of torture.<\/span><\/p>\n

His most recent report found that an independent oversight mechanism, designed to ensure that inmates weren\u2019t being kept in these units indefinitely, was not always used. Doob found \u201c105 cases in which the person stayed in the [Structured Intervention Unit] for at least 76 days (and in some cases more than 120 days) and there was no record of the case ever being sent to an [external review].\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Sapers has a history of taking on the federal government. In 2015, he was <\/span>fired from his role<\/span><\/a> as the Correctional Investigator, by the then-Harper government, for raising the alarm on the deplorable conditions inside Canada\u2019s federal prisons.<\/span><\/p>\n

In an interview, Sapers recognized that he has considerable work ahead of him and the new panel. \u201cThere\u2019s a credibility hill to be climbed here,\u201d he told Maclean\u2019s<\/em>.<\/p>\n

At the same time, Sapers said he made specific demands from Blair and Correctional Service Commissioner Anne Kelly. \u201cI\u2019m not going into this naively,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Sapers and the new panel are armed with a mandate to make specific recommendations to the Service, and to demand timely responses from the prison agency. \u201cWe need to figure out how to make credible recommendations, but to hold their feet to the fire to ensure they\u2019re implemented,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

At the same time, he said Doob\u2019s work over the past two years has made clear the scope of the problem, and the need to act.\u00a0\u201cI have no interest in simply restating the problem,\u201d Sapers said.<\/p>\n

The Service has suggested that prolonged stays in these Structured Intervention Units are as common as they are because inmates are choosing to remain in the units, often out of fear of remaining in general<\/a> population. Sapers said that explanation isn\u2019t good enough. \u201cIf you have the overuse of isolation\u2014or you have the circumstance where inmates are choosing isolation over general population\u2014that\u2019s a symptom of a larger problem,\u201d he said. \u201cTo simply rely on isolation is inappropriate\u2014and I think that\u2019s what the courts have found.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sapers is hoping to hit the ground running in the near future.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf this is done right\u2014and I hate to use the word, because it\u2019s overused\u2014it could be transformational.\u201d
\n<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n