Thank you, Mr. Chair.
In this amendment, which is somewhat similar to the one that was defeated, we're recognizing that the legislation is putting in the four-hours rule, the Mandela rule, but because of the broadness of the exceptions, it could very well be that you actually end up not getting that amount of time. You could actually have 22 hours a day in confinement under this legislation, and that would end up qualifying as solitary confinement under Mandela rules and would therefore not be acceptable.
We know that when you're dealing with prisoners who are dealing with mental health issues, any amount of confinement can be much more devastating than for inmates who don't have mental health issues. It can be psychologically harmful, as the Prisoners' Legal Services brief pointed out, “for prisoners with mental disabilities for any amount of time, and after 15 days for anyone else.”
My amendment sets out ways of ensuring that if you've been confined for 15 consecutive days, you're not allowed to be returned to confinement without an in-between period of five days, and that if you've been “confined in a structured intervention unit for more than 60 aggregate days within a 365-day period”, that will also trigger that you've had well above what would be acceptable.
They'd have to watch the aggregate in 365 days, watch the 15 consecutive days, and then also look at other, less restrictive programs to ensure that something is working that's more appropriate for the inmate.
The amendment comes from the same witnesses that I've drawn most of my amendments from, the ones who have the most experience with the prison system and are worried that this bill doesn't meet its intention of ending solitary confinement. These time limit caps would go a long way toward ensuring this legislation really did end solitary confinement.