The prison watchdog is calling for strong safeguards to be put in place on solitary confiment and to prohibit it entirely for inmates who are mentally ill or younger than 21.
The Corrections Investigator Howard Sapers has released his annual report for 2014-2015. Sapers says 14 of 30 prison suicides between 2011 and 2014 took place in a segregation cell and nearly all of the inmates had known mental health issues.
“Five of the 14 inmates who took their life in segregation had been held in those conditions for more than 120 days,” says Sapers.
In his report, Sapers describes the Correctional Service of Canada’s response to the Ashley Smith inquest frustrating and disappointing. He says the CSC’s response did not support core oversight and accountability measures issued by the jury, failing to endorse the jury’s calls to prohibit the placement of mentally ill people in solitary confinment. He says other key recommendations remain unfulfilled.
“Full implementation of these measures would demonstrate that the lessons from the rtrafigc and preventable death of as and others have been indeed learned and acted upon,” he says.
Over the past 10 years the Indigenous population has increased by more than 50-percent and those offenders are more likely to be classified as maximum security, spend more time in segregation and serve more their sentence behind bars. Sapers is calling for a deputy commissioner for aboriginal offenders.
In the 10-year period between 2005 and 2015 the federal inmate population grew by 10-percent. Sapers says this growth can be attributed to year-over-year increases in the admissions of Aboriginal people, minorities and women.
