A federal lawsuit alleges that the Illinois Department of Corrections use of solitary confinement is “cruel, inhumane and offensive to basic human decency.”
The complaint says about 23 hundred people in Illinois prisons are in solitary on any given day. And that many of those people are there for very minor infractions.
Brian Nelson spent 23 years in solitary. He says almost everyone he knows who has survived the experience.. struggles with mental health.
We all have a little closet somewhere. I got a place in the basement-- it’s pitch black. And I just sit there and I cry.
The federal lawsuit is seeking class action status.
The Illinois Department of Corrections would not comment.