In this undated photo provided by the Oregon Justice Resource Center, an adult in custody stands with their arms stretched out inside a cell used for solitary confinement. In June, a group of incarcerated people filed a class-action lawsuit, arguing Oregon's prison system is violating the state Constitution. Separately, a number of lawmakers, led by Rep. Farrah Chaichi, send a letter to the Dept. of Corrections asking the DOC to sharply limit its use of solitary confinement.
Courtesy of Oregon Justice Resource Center/Prison Law Office
It’s not uncommon for adults in custody in the U.S. to find themselves in solitary confinement for a range of behaviors, both violent and non-violent infractions. The practice is well-documented as being psychologically and socially damaging and to worsen the mental health outcomes for those subjected to it. The Oregon Department of Corrections is facing a class action lawsuit over the practice.
And separately, a group of lawmakers has sent the agency a formal request to adopt U.N. standards known as Mandela rules, which would sharply curtail the use of isolation as a common form of discipline. Rep. Farrah Chaichi, D- Beaverton/Aloha, led this effort and she joins us to share more about the lawmakers’ letter, the DOC’s response and what she sees as the next legislative steps.
Note: The following transcript was transcribed using AI and validated for accuracy, readability and formatting by an OPB volunteer.
Geoff Norcross: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Geoff Norcross in for Dave Miller. On any given day, between 80,000 and 120,000 adults are held in solitary confinement in U.S. jails and prisons. That’s according to the group Solitary Watch. In Oregon, several prisoners have filed a class action lawsuit against the practice, saying it violates the state constitution’s prohibition against “harsh, degrading, or dehumanizing treatment of prisoners.” Separately, a group of state lawmakers has formally requested that the Oregon Department of Corrections sharply curtail the use of isolation as a form of discipline. Farrah Chaichi is one of those lawmakers. She’s a Democratic state representative from the district serving Beaverton and Aloha, and she joins us now. Representative Chaichi, welcome to Think Out Loud.
Farrah Chaichi: Thanks for having me.
Norcross: Given that there’s already a lawsuit about the practice, why take this action?
Chaichi: Well, at the time, I didn’t realize that there was a lawsuit coming. I’ve just really been a big advocate for criminal justice reform. I think this is one of the most cruel things that we do in prisons. And so after I went to a symposium in May, I really wanted to come after something that is horrific.
Norcross: What did you learn at that symposium?
Chaichi: Just the depths of the cruelty that happens to adults in custody. That’s what we call people who are in prisons now. If I say AIC, that’s adults in custody.
Norcross: Thank you.
Chaichi: Just the way that we treat AICs behind bars. They don’t have a lot of agency or rights or whatever. And then on top of that, we’re gonna degrade them and cut them off from human contact and use that as a form of punishment when there’s a broad breadth of research that says this is harmful psychologically. It creates negative outcomes for people. There’s just no reason to do it, and it’s literally torture. Like it’s recognized as torture on the international stage.
Norcross: What is your understanding of what solitary confinement in Oregon actually is, and why it’s a problem?
Chaichi: Being locked up for 22 hours a day in a cell that doesn’t have access to any windows and you’re not getting any meaningful human interaction. You’re often cut off from your family, like you can’t communicate with them. If you’re going to a disciplinary unit, you don’t get hygiene products for 30 days, which seems needlessly cruel. I mean, it’s all needlessly cruel, but that seems especially cruel, and you just lose all track of time.
Norcross: And what are the effects of this solitary confinement on people who experience it?
Chaichi: For folks who already have mental health issues, it makes them decompensate even further. For folks who don’t go in there with existing mental health issues, it creates anxiety, depression, trauma. We see that they have worse outcomes for recidivism when they get out later because also, you have to understand that 95% of people who go to prison in the country will come out. So they’re coming back to us in [the] community. And when we inflict this kind of psychological damage on people, they’re coming back out here to their friends, family and communities harmed, and it’s gonna make it harder for them to reintegrate with the rest of their community.
Norcross: Do you have an example of someone in custody in Oregon who was put into solitary and had a really bad outcome?
Chaichi: I don’t know the names, but yes. And there are people who don’t come out of solitary confinement because they’ve committed suicide.
Norcross: OK. What specifically are you asking for from the DOC?
Chaichi: I personally would like to see solitary confinement completely abolished, but right now we’re asking for no more than 15 consecutive days in solitary, and we want there to be meaningful human contact. You can have people separated out of the general prison population for safety reasons, but that doesn’t mean that you have to isolate them completely. They should still be able to call their friends and family, do the programming that they are a part of and have human interactions.
Norcross: You have a term for what you’re asking for. You’re asking that the rules that the state of Oregon adopt align with what are known as the Mandela Rules. What are those?
Chaichi: Basically, what we’re talking about now, meaningful human contact, no more than 15 days, basically treating people with the human dignity and respect that they deserve, that is inherent to all of us as human beings. Just because you are an AIC doesn’t mean that you are less than a person.
Norcross: It’s interesting, you did get a response from the Oregon Department of Corrections Director Mike Reese. He sent you and your fellow lawmakers a letter this week. And you mentioned meaningful contact, and in his letter, Director Reese says, “A standardized definition of the term meaningful human contact is being developed to ensure clarity and consistency across institutions. We currently engage AICs with special housing program coordinators, mental health sessions, health services education, and other evidence-based programs. The special housing unit team is also establishing procedures to accurately track meaningful human contact for data reporting purposes. This will support compliance, program evaluation, and improvements in service delivery.” How do you respond to that?
Chaichi: I think that them working on defining this stuff, they’re creating a foundation for what we’re asking for. So I think that that’s actually a pretty good step.
Norcross: OK. When did you become aware of this problem in Oregon specifically?
Chaichi: Well, I’ve been driven by criminal justice reform since high school when I joined Amnesty International, which I think was probably the first time I learned about what solitary confinement was. But in Oregon specifically, I’ve been hearing about it since I started in the Legislature in 2023 because I’m a member of the Judiciary Committee. You have folks coming in and advocating about stuff, including former adults in custody, where they tell you about their experiences.
And then in May, there was a symposium about solitary confinement specifically that the Oregon Justice Resource Center put on, I think with Unlock the Box, which is a national organization that’s working on solitary confinement issues. And I got to hear stories of people who have actually been in solitary, especially one person who was clearly retaliated against for the work that he was doing as a jailhouse lawyer, Mark Wilson. He got to explain what happened. He got six months in solitary confinement after being found in possession of contraband, but that contraband was a toy telephone.
Norcross: Representative Chaichi, I wanna refer back to that letter that Director Mike Reese sent you. He said, “We recognize the broad body of research identifying the potential harms associated with prolonged solitary confinement, particularly for individuals with mental health needs and other vulnerabilities. However, the term ‘prolonged solitary confinement’ has a specific legal definition that the DOC does not follow in practice. DOC does use special housing units to handle a variety of safety, security, behavioral, medical, or operational needs. All special housing procedures are guided by our desire to provide the least restrictive environment appropriate to maintain safety. These procedures are regularly reviewed to support an adult in custody’s prompt, safe, and successful return to less restrictive housing.” How do you respond to that?
Chaichi: I think that there are a lot of different phrases that get used for different types of housing. It’s kind of like whack-a-mole, I guess. Like, we don’t call it solitary confinement. We have a disciplinary segregation unit, an intensive management unit. So I need to parse what the actual terms mean in practice rather than what they are on a piece of paper, just because that’s not what they do. Currently, under the specific definitions and words that we’re saying, doesn’t mean that the impact isn’t what’s happening, this isolation of people and punitive isolation of people.
Norcross: But you do have to have specifics and you do have to have verifiable and concrete limits. And in fact, Director Reese mentions that, “The legal and international prolonged solitary confinement definition is the confinement of an incarcerated person to a cell for 22 to 24 hours a day with a lack of meaningful human contact for a duration exceeding 15 days.” Is that your understanding of the definition too, and is that not good?
Chaichi: Yes. But they’re talking about defining meaningful contact. What does meaningful contact mean? Because for some people, the nurse that’s passing out the meds is considered meaningful contact, but you’re not actually engaging with a human on a person-to-person level, which is part of that isolation problem that we’re talking about.
Norcross: Do you think that there is any reason to remove an incarcerated person from the prison population, even for just a little while?
Chaichi: You can definitely remove people from situations when they’re emotionally dysregulated. We’re not saying you can’t do that, but we are saying that you can’t keep them there for weeks, months. I mean, I don’t think we’re doing it for years, but other jurisdictions are. You can’t do that for a prolonged period of time, specifically if it’s in response to a disciplinary issue. Like if somebody is emotionally dysregulated, and they are physically a safety risk to themselves or others, that’s one thing. But putting people in disciplinary segregation because they were disrespectful or they were in the wrong section that they’re not allowed to be in is a whole other issue.
Norcross: OK, so you’ve made a request to the Department of Corrections and you have gotten a response. I’m assuming that you’re not crazy about the response and you think it should be stronger. So what is next for you and your colleagues in the state Legislature?
Chaichi: Well, I appreciate that they are trying. But we want to do a bill, or at least my office wants to do a bill anyway, because right now, we’re looking at rules, policies of DOC by itself. They get to do that. But that can change based on whoever is in charge at the agency, in the governor’s office. The Legislature has a responsibility to set forward a positive vision about what we actually want to see happen. And so my office is gonna bring a bill next session.
Norcross: Are you watching this lawsuit that the prisoners have brought against the DOC too? Is that going to guide your actions as well?
Chaichi: I’m watching it, but the judicial branch is going to react to what things are right now, and I want us to move forward with a brighter path, not just a, this is the least that you have to do, and you’re currently being in violation of this particular provision of the Constitution. They don’t legislate, we legislate, so it’ll be nice to hear what they have to say, but I think we should be doing our work independent of that.
Norcross: What gives you hope that the practice of solitary confinement in Oregon prisons will change in any kind of substantial way?
Chaichi: Well, that it’s indefensible, this practice. Like you’re not hearing from DOC in that letter, we like this and we want to continue doing it. I think that the inertia of these large agencies, corrections in the United States for centuries at this point, makes people think that it can’t change. We have a flag in my office that says better things are necessary and possible, and I feel like a lot of people forget that second half, but it is possible to change it even if it’s been this way for a very long time.
Norcross: OK. Why do you personally care about this? Why is it something that you’ve tried to kind of lead the parade on when it comes to reforming the way this practice happens at the state level?
Chaichi: Because they think that we should be respecting the inherent dignity of every person no matter what and folks have done some not great things, but that doesn’t mean that we should treat them like they are inhuman, and we lose our own humanity treating people inhumanely.
Norcross: Farrah Chaichi, thank you so much for the time. I appreciate it.
Chaichi: Thank you.
Norcross: Farrah Chaichi is a Democratic representative from District 3, which covers Beaverton and Aloha.
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