Judge rejects latest request to release prisoners due to COVID-19
By Laura Crimaldi Globe Staff,Updated February 18, 2021, 6:00 p.m.
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The North Central Correctional Institution in Gardner.Lane Turner/Globe Staff
ruling
that although conditions inside the facilities âcontinue to deprive inmates of basic needs,â the state hasnât violated constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment.
âThe Court fully understands the consequences of any lapses in preventing the spread of a virus that has killed at least 19 prison inmates and over 15,000 Massachusetts residents,â Suffolk Superior Court Judge Robert L. Ullmann wrote in his order. âHowever, these lapses reflect sporadic mistakes and sporadic lack of sufficient attention to detail, which is far below the standard of deliberate indifference necessary to establish a constitutional violation.â
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In December, Covid-19 infections in prisons in the United States hit a record 25,000 in one week. Among correctional staff that month, there were an additional 5,000 new infections a week, leading to spread in surrounding communities. According to a New York Times database, collectively, more than 580,000 people at correctional institutions have been infected. The prisoner death toll has now surpassed 2,000.
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Eleven months into the pandemic, the U.S. prison system has not gotten control of its rising caseload, which is likely still underestimated, according to The Marshall Project, a nonprofit journalism outlet focused on criminal justice issues. Doctors, attorneys, prison reform advocates, and public health researchers are increasingly concerned about one of the tactics that prisons are using to isolate symptomatic individuals: solitary confinement, the prolonged use of which is an intern
An inmates stands in a cell inside one of Massachusetts county jails. (Jesse Costa/WBUR)
Negotiations continue between Massachusetts correction officials and the Justice Department over last year s scathing federal report on mental health treatment in the state s prisons.
Andrew Peck, the state s undersecretary for criminal justice, said state corrections officials are working well with the DOJ, and a settlement over the report is in progress.
Last November, Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling released the report after a two-year investigation that found the state Department of Correction violated prisoners constitutional rights by not providing adequate mental health care.
Lelling s report focused on detainees placed on so-called mental health watch, a status that typically results in a prisoner being isolated in a cell with few belongings or clothes. The prisoner is then closely monitored by medical staff and correction officers