Solitary Watch

by Sara Vogel and Valerie Kiebala

November 29, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: Only two days remain in November, when all donations to Solitary Watch will be TRIPLED through NewsMatch. Donations in any amount are deeply valued and appreciated. Please consider making a donation today. ___________________________________________________________________________ This week’s pick of news and commentary about solitary confinement: In mid-October, as part of a […]

by Jean Casella

November 28, 2023

Dear Friends: For tens of thousands of people locked away in U.S. prisons and jails, the extreme deprivation and isolation of solitary confinement causes unimaginable suffering. One person living in solitary described his existence to us as “a soul-destroying loneliness that never ends.” In this context, even the smallest human connection can make a difference—and […]

by Sara Vogel

November 22, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: Solitary Watch has appointed award-winning journalist Juan Moreno Haines to serve as editor-in-chief. With this appointment, Haines becomes one of a very few currently incarcerated individuals to hold a leadership position at a newsroom or nonprofit organization. Haines has spent 27 years in the California prison system and served […]

by Jean Casella and Juan Moreno Haines

November 21, 2023

MAKE A TRIPLED DONATION TO SOLITARY WATCH TODAY Dear Friends: Since its founding, Solitary Watch has maintained contact with thousands of people who inhabit the darkest corners of the U.S. punishment system, cut off from human contact and out of sight of the public and the press. They have served as our eyes and ears […]

by Jean Casella

November 16, 2023

Earlier this week, Solitary Watch announced some very exciting news with the following press release. The appointment of incarcerated journalist Juan Moreno Haines as our editor-in-chief ushers in a new era for us, in which we will deepen our longstanding commitment to supporting and publishing the work of incarcerated writers. Juan is the perfect person to […]

by Sara Vogel

November 15, 2023

The Supreme Court has declined to hear an appeal from an incarcerated man in Illinois who argued that his prolonged solitary confinement and denial of outdoor exercise violates the Eighth Amendment. Michael Johnson, the plaintiff, spent three years in solitary in a small, windowless cell at Pontiac Correctional Center in Illinois, where he was routinely […]

by Jean Casella

November 10, 2023

Dear Donors, Readers, and Friends: NewsMatch is back, and it’s more exciting than ever! This year: Every dollar you give—up to $1,000—will be matched… and then matched again! As a small-but-mighty organization, our time and resources are spent all year exposing the hidden torture taking place deep within prisons and jails throughout the United States. […]

by Sara Vogel

November 8, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: The gifted and prolific incarcerated writer Tony D. Vick has served 28 years in prison in Tennessee, three of them in solitary confinement. In a new essay in our ongoing series Voices from Solitary, Vick reflects on the time he spent in solitary, the lingering effects of isolation, and […]

by Voices from Solitary

November 7, 2023

Tony D. Vick has served 28 years in prison on a double life-with-parole sentence in Tennessee. During that time, he was in solitary confinement on and off for three years. A prolific writer, Vick has been published in magazines such as Filter and Truthout. Hopeful of the current prison reform movement, he writes about the […]

by Sara Vogel

November 1, 2023

This week’s pick of news and commentary about solitary confinement: A new series from The Guardian explores the widespread sexual abuse by prison staff at California Central Women’s Facility. Analysis of court records and misconduct reports reveal a system that allows some guards to prey on incarcerated women, and silences the women with threats of […]

by Sara Vogel

October 26, 2023

This week’s pick of news and commentary about solitary confinement: In letters written to the Massachusetts Attorney General, a group of incarcerated men announced their hunger strike over conditions in the “Secure Adjustment Unit” at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Massachusetts. The 19 men request an immediate investigation, stating that they suffer chronic abuse by […]

by Sara Vogel

October 18, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: In a recent article, published in partnership with the Davis Vanguard, James Anderson investigates the use of solitary confinement on vulnerable populations at Maguire Correctional Facility, the main jail in San Mateo County. Approximately one-fifth of Maguire’s population is housed in solitary confinement—nearly four times higher than the national […]

by James Anderson

October 12, 2023

This article is published in partnership with the Davis Vanguard and Kansas City Defender. Maguire Correctional Facility lies just a few blocks from San Francisco Bay, and serves as the main jail for San Mateo County. A largely affluent suburban area that connects the city of San Francisco to the north and famed Silicon Valley […]

by Sara Vogel

October 11, 2023

This week’s pick of news and commentary about solitary confinement: The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has issued new guidelines aimed at reducing the use of solitary confinement. Under the proposed policy, the number of offenses punishable by solitary would be reduced from 34 to 19 and individuals in solitary would be granted at […]

by Valerie Kiebala

October 6, 2023

This week’s pick of news and commentary about solitary confinement: A lawsuit originally filed by incarcerated people pro-se documents severe constitutional and human rights violations by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections in a unit called the Security Threat Group Management Unit (STGMU) at State Correctional Institution Fayette. The lawsuit alleges that 30 to 40 mostly […]

by Sara Vogel

September 27, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: In an article this week for Solitary Watch, Spencer Weinreich explores the origin of solitary confinement during the witch trials in the seventeenth century city of Bamberg. Writing about the prison Malefizhaus, Weinreich draws parallels between the torture faced by accused witches and the torture of modern solitary confinement. […]

by Spencer Weinreich

September 25, 2023

Spencer Weinreich is a Junior Fellow in the Harvard Society of Fellows and Lecturer on the History of Science at Harvard University. He is currently working on a history of solitary confinement, entitled An Experimental Box. The Malefizhaus, described in this piece, is also the subject of Dr. Weinreich’s recent article in the Journal of […]

by Sara Vogel

September 20, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: A new article originally published in Truthout, by Solitary Watch contributor Victoria Law, examines the impact of recent judicial and legislative decisions in California on the future of solitary confinement in the United States. Throughout the article, Law provides context for the recent California Ninth Circuit decision to a […]

by Victoria Law

September 18, 2023

This article was originally published on Truthout. The movement against prolonged solitary confinement in California is facing new challenges on two different fronts. First, on August 24, a three-judge panel handed down a ruling ending a federal magistrate’s ability to monitor and limit California’s use of prolonged solitary confinement. However, prisoners’ rights advocates aren’t giving […]

by Sara Vogel

September 13, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: In the most recent edition of Voices from Solitary, incarcerated artist and activist Timothy Young writes about his struggles living on California’s Death Row. According to Young, life on Death Row often entails frequent lockdowns, strip searches, and handcuffing whenever a person leaves their cell. Throughout the essay, Young […]

by Voices from Solitary

September 11, 2023

Timothy James Young, currently 53 years old, has been incarcerated for 24 years, and has lived on San Quentin State Prison’s Death Row for 17 of them. Young has maintained his innocence since his arrest, and believes that false testimony against him only arose from a deal with a jail informant. Living on Death Row, […]

by Sara Vogel

September 8, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: This week, Solitary Watch Senior Writers Juan Moreno Haines and Katie Rose Quandt were named winner of the 2023 Media for a Just Society Award in the category of “Media by a Person Who is Incarcerated” for their article titled “San Quentin Is Still Punishing People for Being Sick.” […]

by Sara Vogel

August 30, 2023

New this week from Solitary Watch: The latest fact sheet in our new series covers Solitary Confinement and Prison Oversight. The fact sheet, by Mirilla Zhu, states: “To ensure the effective implementation of solitary confinement reforms, and to monitor prison conditions more generally, a small but increasing number of states have established prison oversight bodies […]

by Jean Casella

August 29, 2023

Today, Solitary Watch is publishing the sixth in a new series of fact sheets offering facts, analysis, and resources on a variety of topics related to solitary confinement in U.S. prisons, jails, and immigrant and juvenile facilities. This fact sheet, written by Mirilla Zhu, is titled “Solitary Confinement & Prison Oversight.” As the fact sheet […]

by Sara Vogel

August 24, 2023

Previously confidential records from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties confirm reports of extensive abuse against detained immigrants. The reports document ICE’s extensive use of solitary confinement, medical neglect, mistreatment of transgender immigrants, and failure to prevent sexual assault in its facilities. As of July 2023, ICE had […]

by Sara Vogel

August 16, 2023

The Memory Disorder Unit at Federal Medical Center Devens is the first federal facility built to house incarcerated people with Alzheimer’s Disease and other forms of dementia. According to Timothy Doherty, a senior officer specialist who helps run the unit, approximately 90 percent of the unit’s population “don’t know what they did. Some of them […]