Emma Ginn and Annie Viswanathan on the effect of solitary confinement on immigration detainees and Dean Kingham on prisoners abandoned to close supervision centres. Plus, Howard Thomas on steps towards sending fewer people to prison
Prolonged solitary confinement is an extreme form of treatment, prohibited in all circumstances under international law. Your article (Fifty-two prisoners in close supervision units ‘that may amount to torture’, 26 July) exposed this practice in highly restrictive prisons.
Prolonged solitary confinement has in fact become routine in all prisons during the pandemic, with many individuals being confined alone or with a cellmate for 22 to 24 hours each day since March 2020.