New York Prison Officials Found Routinely Violating HALT Act With Overuse of Solitary Confinement
by Matt Clarke
On June 18, 2024, the New York Supreme Court for Albany County found that the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) routinely violated Correctional Law § 137(6)(k)(ii), the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement (HALT) Act, by subjecting prisoners to solitary confinement that exceeded statutory limits without making factual findings mandated by the HALT Act.
Enacted in 2022, that law limits placement in “segregated confinement”—defined as in-cell confinement exceeding 17 hours per day—to a maximum of three consecutive days and six days in any 30-day period. Beyond that, the HALT Act requires DOCCS to find “by written decision” and “pursuant to an evidentiary hearing” that the actions of the prisoner involved physical injury, sexual assault, extortion, coercion, a major prison disruption, possession of a weapon or dangerous contraband, and/or escape, such that placing the prisoner in general population would create both a “significant risk of imminent serious physical injury” and “‘an unreasonable risk’ to facility security.” Even then, the law places an absolute limit on confinement in segregation of 15 consecutive days or 20 days within any 60-day period.
Yet some of the Plaintiffs in the case said that they were sentenced to months, or even years, of segregated confinement. DOCCS claimed that all Tier III disciplinary violations met the requirements of HALT for extended solitary confinement. So with the aid of attorneys Phillip Gummell, Molly K. Biklen and Ifeyinwa Karen Chikezie of the New York Civil Liberties Union in New York City, along with Andrew Austin Stecker, Hallie Elizabeth Mitnick and Elsie Maria Czuchna of Prisoners’ Legal Service of New York in Buffalo, the prisoners filed suit challenging the use of extended solitary confinement for violating the HALT Act. As PLN reported, the trial court then granted class-action status on September 11, 2023. [See: PLN, Dec. 2023, p.58.]
In its most recent decision, the Court reviewed DOCCS disciplinary documentation for findings specifically required by the HALT Act. But the Court found neither the term “heinous” nor the term “destructive” anywhere—even though state Correction Law § 137(6)(k)(ii) (A-G) requires a finding that what a prisoner did to get thrown in “the hole” was “so heinous or destructive” that leaving him in the prison’s general population “creates a significant risk of imminent serious physical injury to staff or other incarcerated persons and creates an unreasonable risk to the security of the facility.”
DOCCS argued that those findings were “inherent” in findings by disciplinary officers that the prisoners had committed the acts for which they were disciplined. But the Court rejected that bit of circular reasoning. DOCCS also said that it had no policy making a blanket claim that Tier III disciplinary violation sanctions satisfied HALT Act requirements. But again the Court refused to be baited into trying to disprove a negative. Rather, it noted that DOCCS had failed to submit evidence that the challenged policy did or did not exist, “other than the general and ambiguous denial in their answer.” The Court then declared the policy null and void anyway, calling it “arbitrary and capricious” and noncompliant with the HALT Act. It also declared null and void any previous determinations made pursuant to the policy.
“Some of the shenanigans of DOCCS to preserve this really torturous regime are documented in this litigation,” said New York Civil Liberties Union head Donna Lieberman. “And hopefully, this litigation will put an end to some of those really harmful shenanigans.”
The Court ordered DOCCS to make HALT-compliant findings in future disciplinary hearings before extending any sanction in segregated housing. It also invited the parties to submit documentation and argument regarding petitioners’ legal fees, and PLN will update developments as they are available. See: Fields v. Martuscello, N.Y. Supr. (Albany Cnty.), Case No. 902997-23.
Additional source: New York Times
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Related legal case
Fields v. Martuscello
| Year | 2024 |
|---|---|
| Cite | N.Y. Supr. (Albany Cnty.), Case No. 902997-23 |
| Level | State Supreme Court |