Federal district judge finds confinement condition Connecticut's former death row inmates to be unconstitutional
This local article, headlined "U.S. Judge rules former Connecticut death row inmate’s incarceration amounts to cruel and unusual punishment," reports on notable prison rulings handed down by a federal court earlier this week. Here are the basics:
A federal judge has condemned high security prison conditions in Connecticut, ruling that a convicted cop killer who was confined for years on the state’s death row has been subjected to “cruel and unusual” punishment.
Ruling in one of at least a half dozen federal civil rights suits by former death row inmate Richard Reynolds, U.S. District Judge Stefan Underhill ordered the state to immediately relax the conditions under which he is confined and said he will consider imposing some sort of “damages” on the correction officers Reynolds names in his suit as defendants.
Underhill concludes in a set of decisions released Wednesday, one of them 57 pages long, that the conditions of confinement imposed by the state on former death row inmates — in particular the periods of time during which they are locked alone in their cells — amounts to a Constitutional violation. “Reynolds committed a heinous crime ― he murdered a law enforcement officer,” Underhill wrote. “Reynolds was sentenced to death and awaited execution for twenty-one years. When the death penalty was abolished retroactively in Connecticut, Reynolds was resentenced to life without the possibility of release. The fact that people commit inhumane crimes does not give the state the right to treat them inhumanely. Solitary confinement is an extreme form of punishment with a long history in American penal systems.”
In a related ruling, Underhill gave the Department of Correction a list of instructions that would relax Reynolds’ confinement and he ordered the state to provide him with a progress report in 30 days. Among other things, Underhill said Reynolds should be allowed to socialize with inmates who have a lower security classification and be allowed “contact” with visitors. Underhill also said that a “hearing in damages will follow to determine the scope and amount of liability of” the 10 or so correction officers Reynolds named in his suit....
Reynolds was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1995 for killing Waterbury police officer Walter Williams three years earlier. In 2017, he was resentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release after the state Supreme Court ruled the death penalty was unconstitutional. Reynolds has been confined for 23 years at the Northern Correctional Institution in Somers, the state’s most secure maximum security prison. He is classified for security purposes as a “special circumstances inmate” — the highest classification — and lives alone in a 12 foot by 7 foot cell.
At the center of Underhill’s ruling is the assertion that a variety of conditions imposed in prison on former death row inmates — extended periods locked alone in their cells, prohibition against mingling with lower security inmates and their inability to touch visitors amounts in Reynolds’ case to psychological torture and it could be damaging his mental health.
Underhill wrote that Reynolds is allowed out of his cell for two 15-minute periods to eat lunch and dinner. He is allowed to take one 15-minute shower each day, two hours of recreation each day for six days a week and two hours of weekly indoor gym recreation. Reynolds may, upon request, receive visits from clergy, attorneys, or prison medical staff. “Other than those periods, Reynolds remains isolated with no contact with anyone but the six other inmates on special circumstances status,” Underhill wrote. “Although he is allowed social visits with family members, no physical contact is permitted during those visits, which occur through Plexiglass.”
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