CALCULATING
TORTURE

Analysis of Federal,
State, and Local Data
Showing More Than
122,000 People in
Solitary Confinement in
U.S. Prisons and Jails

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A Report by Solitary Watch and the Unlock the Box Campaign
May 2023

1

03

Introduction

04

Key Analysis:
Prisons and Jails Lock More Than 122,000 People in Solitary
Confinement for 22 or More Hours on a Given Day

04
08
08

Federal and State Prisons
Local and Federal Jails
Total: Federal and State Prisons and Local and Federal Jails

10

Why This Analysis Provides a Fuller Picture of the Number
of People in Solitary Confinement Than Previous Counts

11

Solitary Confinement Has Even Higher Prevalence and Impacts
Even More People Than These Numbers Indicate

12

Prisons and Jails Continue to Lock People in Solitary for Days,
Weeks, Months, Years, and Decades

13

Conclusion and Recommendations

Calculating Torture

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May 2023

2

INTRODUCTION
Solitary confinement is a torturous and deadly
practice.1 Prisons, jails, and detention centers
inflict solitary confinement disproportionately on
Black people, Latino/a/x people, Native people,
and other people of color.2 Decades of research
have attested to the lived experience of people
who have been incarcerated and their loved ones,
corroborating that solitary causes devastating harm
to physical, mental, and behavioral health and
is counterproductive to any goals of safety.3 Any
length of time in solitary confinement—days, or even
hours at a time—can have severe consequences.4
While there has been a growing recognition of
the need to end solitary confinement, and some
groundbreaking policy changes have shown
movement in that direction, the use of solitary
confinement in prisons, jails, and detention centers
across the United States remains common and
widespread.5
This report provides the first ever comprehensive
accounting of the total use of solitary confinement
in both prisons and jails across the United States.
Analysis of data recently released by the federal
Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) and by two state
prison systems that did not report to BJS, as well
as data from a survey of local jails conducted by
the Vera Institute of Justice, reveals that state and
federal prisons and local and federal jails in the U.S.
have reported on a given day locking a combined
total of more than 122,000 people in solitary
confinement for 22 or more hours.6

In addition, the figures represent a snapshot of the
number of people in solitary confinement at a given
moment in time, while many times that number are
locked in solitary during the course of a year.
Moreover, the numbers include only people in
prisons and jails. Immigration detention facilities
lock people in solitary confinement nearly 9,000
times a year, and children and other young people
in youth facilities continue to be subjected to
solitary.7
Even given all these excluded factors, the numbers
far exceed those of other recent counts, which, in the
absence of more comprehensive figures, have been
widely quoted by media outlets and even scholars
and advocates.8
Solitary Watch has been investigating and
documenting the widespread use of solitary
confinement for more than a dozen years to
increase awareness of and accountability for this
humanitarian crisis. The Unlock the Box Campaign
and activists across the country have been urging
policy makers at the local, state, and federal levels
to build on recent efforts to end or limit the use of
solitary and to take much more substantial action
to significantly reduce or eliminate its use. Together,
we believe that accurate information—including the
most comprehensive possible count of the numbers
of people in solitary confinement—is critical to
creating change.

These newly available numbers come closer than
have any previously published figures in accounting
for the number of people in solitary confinement.
Yet they still undoubtedly undercount the number of
individuals who experience solitary and the number
impacted by it.
To begin with, the numbers are self-reported by
correctional systems. Further, they cover only solitary
confinement that involves being locked in a cell 22
or more hours a day. They do not include various
informal or transient forms of solitary confinement
such as group lockdowns or quarantines, nor do
they include so-called alternatives that amount to
solitary by another name.

INTRODUCTION

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Calculating Torture

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May 2023

3

KEY ANALYSIS: PRISONS AND JAILS LOCK MORE THAN 122,000 PEOPLE IN
SOLITARY CONFINEMENT FOR 22 OR MORE HOURS ON A GIVEN DAY
Data recently released by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS),
supplemented by state data reported by California and Virginia, reveals that prisons and jails across the
U.S. reported locking more than 122,000 people in solitary confinement for 22 or more hours on a given
day in 2019.9 This data provides a snapshot of the number of people in solitary confinement across the
country on a given day in the most recent year for which comprehensive figures are available.10

Federal and State Prisons
Federal and state prisons reported locking nearly 81,000 people—roughly 6.3 percent of all people
in prison—in solitary confinement for 22 or more hours on a given day.
RESTRICTIVE HOUSING IN U.S. STATE AND FEDERAL PRISON IN 2019, SUMMARY

JURISDICTION

FEDERAL

TOTAL PRISON POPULATION
(BJS)

INDIVIDUALS IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and State Records)

PERCENTAGE IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and State Records)

159,233

11,011

6.92

STATE

1,126,970

69,757

6.19

TOTAL

1,286,203

80,768

6.28

This analysis includes the latest available data on restrictive housing from the BJS. Released in August
2022, it documents the use of solitary confinement in mid-2019 for both the federal prison system and
state systems that self-reported to BJS.11 It also includes data reported by two states, California and
Virginia, that did not report on their use of solitary confinement to BJS but did report publicly on their use
of solitary in the same time period covered by BJS.12 (One state, West Virginia, did not report to the BJS
and also made no data on its use of solitary publicly available.)

ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

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RESTRICTIVE HOUSING IN U.S. STATE AND FEDERAL PRISONS IN 2019, BY JURISDICTION

JURISDICTION

TOTAL PRISON POPULATION
(BJS)

INDIVIDUALS IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and state records)

PERCENTAGE IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and state records)

ALABAMA

17,540

953

5.4

ALASKA

3,679

953

5.4

ARIZONA

43,914

2,484

5.7

ARKANSAS

14,825

2,007

13.5

CALIFORNIA

121,678

4,742

3.9

COLORADO

18,255

258

1.4

CONNECTICUT

13,283

283

2.1

DELEWARE

4,625

0

0.0

FLORIDA

84,751

10,926

12.9

GEORGIA

46,288

4,258

9.2

HAWAII

1,438

31

2.2

IDAHO

7,131

191

2.7

ILLINOIS

38,337

1,357

3.5

INDIANA

25,732

2,057

8.0

IOWA

8,488

411

8.0

KANSAS

9,631

1,010

10.5

KENTUCKY

12,635

976

7.7

LOUISIANA

17,940

1,302

7.3

ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

5

JURISDICTION

TOTAL PRISON POPULATION
(BJS)

INDIVIDUALS IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and state records)

PERCENTAGE IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and state records)

MAINE

1,524

31

2.0

MARYLAND

17,888

1,567

8.8

MASSACHUSETTS

7,993

269

3.4

MICHIGAN

38,370

1,629

4.2

MINNESOTA

9,221

497

5.4

MISSISSIPPI

13,441

636

4.7

MISSOURI

28,172

3,356

11.9

MONTANA

2,763

119

4.3

NEBRASKA

4,732

337

7.1

NEVADA

12,202

3,140

25.7

NEW HAMPSHIRE

2,147

110

5.1

NEW JERSEY

17,610

1,375

7.8

NEW MEXICO

6,226

409

6.6

NEW YORK

44,979

2,501

5.6

NORTH CAROLINA

32,444

1,479

4.6

NORTH DAKOTA

1,571

32

2.0

OHIO

48,127

1,980

4.1

OKLAHOMA

23,409

2,525

10.8

OREGON

14,736

871

5.9

ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

6

JURISDICTION

TOTAL PRISON POPULATION
(BJS)

INDIVIDUALS IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and state records)

PERCENTAGE IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(BJS and state records)

PENNSYLVANIA

45,340

2,014

4.4

NORTH DAKOTA

1,571

32

2.0

OHIO

48,127

1,980

4.1

OKLAHOMA

23,409

2,525

10.8

OREGON

14,736

871

5.9

PENNSYLVANIA

45,340

2,014

4.4

RHODE ISLAND

2,663

96

3.6

SOUTH CAROLINA

17,605

912

5.2

TENNESSEE

21,530

2077

9.6

TEXAS

136,836

5,492

4.0

UTAH

5,195

349

6.7

VERMONT

1,489

44

3.0

VIRGINIA

29,994

521

1.7

WASHINGTON

16,613

784

4.7

WEST VIRGINIA

5,119

N/A

N/A

STATE TOTALS

1,126,970

69,757

6.19

TOTAL STATE +
FEDERAL PRISONS

1,286,203

80,768

6.28

ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

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Local and Federal Jails
Local jails across the country and federal pre-trial detention facilities are estimated to have locked more
than 42,000 people in solitary confinement for 22 or more hours a day on a given day in mid-2019.

RESTRICTIVE HOUSING IN U.S. LOCAL AND FEDERAL JAILS IN 2019

JURISDICTION

TOTAL JAIL POPULATION
(BJS)

ESTIMATED INDIVIDUALS IN
RESTRICTIVE HOUSING IN JAILS

ESTIMATED PERCENTAGE
IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING
(Vera Institute of Justice)

LOCAL JAILS

734,470

5.64

41,424

FEDERAL JAILS

11,490

5.64

648

745,960

5.64

42,072

TOTAL

From the results of a survey distributed to nearly all jails in the United States, the
Vera Institute of Justice found that on a given day, 5.64 percent of people in jails were in
solitary confinement for 22 or more hours a day at the time of the survey.13 According to data
released by BJS in October 2021, at midyear 2019 there were 745,960 people in jails across the
country, including 734,470 people in local jails and 11,490 in federal pre-trial detention.14
Taken together, these figures indicate that on a given day in mid-2019 an estimated
42,072 people were locked in solitary confinement for 22 or more hours a day, including an
estimated 41,424 people in solitary in local jails and an estimated 648 people in solitary in
federal pre-trial detention.

Total: Federal and State Prisons and Local and Federal Jails
Across the United States, federal and state adult prisons and local and federal jails
reported on a given day in 2019 locking approximately 122,840 people in solitary
confinement  22 or more hours a day.

122,840
people in solitary

   confinement for

22 or more
hours
a day
ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

8

RESTRICTIVE HOUSING IN ALL U.S. PRISONS AND JAILS IN 2019

JURISDICTION

TOTAL PRISON AND
JAIL POPULATION 2019

FEDERAL PRISONS

TOTAL
IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING

PERCENTAGE
IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING

159,223

11,011

6.92

STATE PRISONS

1,126,970

69,757

6.19

FEDERAL JAILS

11,490

648

5.64

LOCAL JAILS

734,470

41,424

5.64

2,032,163

122,840

6.04

TOTAL

Of these 122,840 individuals, the largest proportion—56.8 percent—are held in
solitary confinement in state prisons, followed by 33.7 percent in local jails, 9.0
percent in federal prisons, and 0.5 percent in federal jails.
BREAKDOWN OF PEOPLE IN RESTRICTIVE HOUSING IN ALL U.S. PRISONS AND JAILS IN 2019

FEDERAL PRISONS
LOCAL JAILS

9.0%

33.7%

STATE PRISONS
FEDERAL JAILS

0.5%

56.8%
ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

9

WHY THIS ANALYSIS PROVIDES A FULLER
PICTURE OF THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE IN SOLITARY
CONFINEMENT THAN PREVIOUS COUNTS
Of note, previous reported counts of the number of
people in solitary confinement in the United States
have been substantially lower than the number
presented in this report. Several factors contribute
to this discrepancy.
First and most significant, for documentation
on the use of solitary confinement in prisons,
other recent reports—specifically, the series
released by the Liman Center at Yale Law School
in collaboration with the Correctional Leaders
Association (CLA)—have provided only the number
of people who had been held in prolonged
solitary confinement beyond 15 continuous
days, rather than the total number of people
in solitary confinement.15 For a fuller picture of
the use of solitary confinement—and because
any length of time in solitary can be harmful
and counterproductive to goals of safety—it is
imperative to also report on the total number of
people in solitary confinement for any length of
time. Both measures—the number of people in
solitary confinement and the number of people
in prolonged solitary confinement beyond 15
continuous days—are useful and important
separate data points for understanding the use of
solitary.
Second, for documentation on the use of solitary
confinement in prisons, the reports by CLA and
Liman have used private surveys for collecting
the data, whereas this report uses data collected
by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). The
data are self-reported in both instances, and
thus continue to have limitations. However, the
governmental BJS data collection, which was

part of BJS’s periodic Census of State and Federal
Correctional Facilities, while again self-reported,
had a higher response rate, with only a few
states not providing data. The present report also
separately identified and uses publicly reported
data by two states.
Third, other reports—including those produced
by BJS—have focused on the use of solitary
confinement in federal and state prisons
separately from its use in local and federal jails,
while this report provides an estimate of the total
number of people in all these facilities combined.
Of note, the BJS snapshot data, and in turn the
present report, has not collected or reported on
certain crucial information related to the use
of solitary confinement that the CLA and Liman
surveys and the Vera Institute surveys have
collected and reported on. These include racial
disparities in the infliction of solitary confinement,
disproportionate imposition of solitary
confinement on people with mental health needs,
and breakdowns in the use of solitary confinement
along other demographic characteristics such as
gender or age.
The present report gives a fuller picture of the
total number of people in solitary—a number
that greatly exceeds those of other counts.
Nevertheless, because of a lack of available
data, it still has considerable limitations and thus
significantly undercounts the number of people in
solitary across the United States, as discussed in
the following section.

ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

10

SOLITARY CONFINEMENT HAS EVEN HIGHER PREVALENCE AND
IMPACTS EVEN MORE PEOPLE THAN THESE NUMBERS INDICATE
This report has documented that more than
122,000 people in adult prisons and jails are in
solitary confinement on a given day for 22 or
more hours a day. In fact, the number of people
subjected to solitary confinement across the
United States is far greater.
First of all, in addition to adult prisons and jails,
immigration detention centers and youth facilities
frequently use solitary confinement. Although
existing data do not provide a snapshot of the
number of people in solitary confinement on a
given day in either of the second two types of
facilities, there are some data on the frequent
infliction of solitary confinement. According to
the Office of the Inspector General for the U.S.
Department of Homeland Security, immigration
detention facilities across the country imposed
44,456 solitary confinement placements from
FY2015 to FY2019, or an average of 8,891 solitary
confinement placements a year.16 Similarly,
youth facilities across the country continue to
lock children and other young people in solitary
confinement.17

On the other hand, after a sharp spike in the
unofficial (and primarily unreported) use of
solitary in the early months of COVID-19, there
may also have been incremental reductions in
the overall use of solitary confinement across
the country since the 2019 data were collected.
Implementation of some of the more significant
legislative changes, such as those in New Jersey,
New York, and Connecticut, would not have begun
soon enough to be reflected in the 2019 data used
in this report. For example, New York State enacted
the Humane Alternatives to Long Term Solitary
Confinement (HALT) law on March 31, 2021, and the
law went into effect on March 31, 2022. As a result
of the law’s initial implementation, there has been
a dramatic reduction in the use of reported solitary
confinement, from nearly 1,800 people in February
2022 to approximately 400 people on December
1, 2022, although the state prison department has
been shown to be violating many components of
the law.21

In addition, all the data relied upon above from
the BJS and the Vera Institute are self-reported
from correctional systems, include only those
uses of solitary confinement where a person is
locked in a cell for 22 or more hours a day, and
rely on those correctional systems to define what
constitutes being in a cell for that amount of time.
As such, the data would not include other forms of
solitary confinement (what should be considered
solitary by another name), where individuals are
still locked in a cell up to 21½ hours a day.18 The
data would also not include situations where a
corrections system provides so-called out-of-cell
time that still involves a person being locked alone
in a recreation pen or other isolated space. These
data also likely do not capture other informal lockins or facility-wide or housing area lockdowns.
Finally, these data include only the number of
people in solitary at a snapshot in time. Far more
people are subjected to solitary confinement
over the course of a month, a year, or an entire
incarceration sentence than would be reflected
in a snapshot of the number of people in solitary
on one day.19 Of note, the use of solitary of
course adversely affects not only people in such
confinement but also harms the well-being of
their loved ones and worsens community safety.20

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ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

11

PRISONS AND JAILS CONTINUE TO LOCK PEOPLE IN SOLITARY
FOR DAYS, WEEKS, MONTHS, YEARS, AND DECADES
Any length of time in solitary confinement,
measured in days or even hours, can cause
severely damaging impacts. Yet correctional
facilities continue to lock people in solitary for
weeks, months, years, and even decades.
According to the CLA and the Liman Center, a
snapshot in 2019 found that between 55,000 and
62,500 people had been in prolonged solitary
confinement for an average of 22 or more hours
a day for at least 15 continuous days.22 Similarly, a
snapshot in 2021 showed that between 41,000 and
48,000 people had been in prolonged solitary
confinement for an average of 22 or more hours
a day for at least 15 continuous days.23 Nearly a
quarter of those individuals had been in solitary
confinement for years, including nearly 4 percent
who had been in solitary confinement for more
than a decade.24
In addition, the Vera Institute of Justice found
that 58 percent of people in solitary in jails
across the country had spent more than 15 days
in solitary—even though the average total length
of stay in jails generally is 26 days.25

Drawing of solitary confinement cell at Louisiana State
Penitentiary, Angola, by Kenny Zulu Whitmore.

ANALYSIS | Calculating Torture

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May 2023

12

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Widespread recognition that solitary confinement causes devastating harm and worsens safety for
everyone, together with a nationwide movement of campaigns led by people who lived through solitary
confinement and loved ones of people in solitary, have generated an increasing number of substantial
policy changes restricting the use of solitary confinement and moving toward ending the practice.26
Activists across the country have been urging policy makers at the federal, state, and local levels to build
on the changes that have been made and take dramatic steps to end solitary confinement. During their
campaigns, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris both committed to ending solitary
confinement.27 New polling data reveal widespread bipartisan support for ending solitary confinement.28
Legislation pending in states across the country seeks to ban solitary for different categories of people
and place a limit of 15 days on solitary for everyone. There are also growing efforts to ban solitary entirely,
including a bill currently pending with veto-proof supermajority support in New York City that would ban
solitary confinement, other than for a maximum of four hours for emergency de-escalation, and require all
people in the city’s jails to have access to at least 14 hours of group out-of-cell time.29
With solitary confinement still so prevalent and impacting hundreds of thousands of people across the
country each year, bold action would be required to stop this torturous practice. Based on best policy
components from enacted and pending legislation across the country, the Unlock the Box Campaign has
called for local, state, and federal policy makers to:

• end solitary confinement for all people, other than for periods of minutes or hours for emergency

de-escalation, and close prisons, jails, and other sites of detention dedicated to solitary confinement;

• implement alternatives that are the opposite of solitary and provide proven forms of separation
involving full days of out-of-cell group program–based interventions;

• provide firm time limits on alternatives and on any form of restrictive housing;

• prohibit any involuntary lock-in for people who are most vulnerable to isolation;

• restrict the justifications for solitary or alternatives to the most egregious, acute acts that pose an
imminent risk of physical harm;

• provide due process protections before any separation, including access to independent decision
makers and representation; and

• ensure meaningful oversight, accountability, and enforcement, including through a private cause
of action, public data reporting, media access, and independent oversight.30

In light of the continued limitations on data discussed in this report, Solitary Watch and Unlock the Box
are also calling for improved data collection and transparent public reporting on the use of solitary
confinement and alternatives to solitary. Data points should include, at a minimum, how many people are
in solitary and in alternative units or programs; how many people are being held in their cells for different
periods of time, including more than 10 hours, 16 hours, and 22 hours a day; lengths of stay in solitary and
alternatives; reasons for placement; number of separate admissions of a person during the reporting
period; number of disciplinary charges issued to participants in alternative programs and sanctions
imposed; demographics, including race, age, gender, and LGBTQI+ identification; mental health and
medical status; special needs; pregnancy status; and finally, incidents of self-harm, suicide attempts and
suicides, and deaths and causes of deaths.
This report documents that the incidence of solitary confinement in this country is far greater than
anyone has previously reported. It is now more urgent than ever that local, state, and federal jurisdictions
across the United States end this massive system of government torture that causes devastating harm;
leads to death; increases the risks of violence in places of detention and outside communities; and is
disproportionately inflicted on Black people, Latino/a/x people, Native people, and other people of color.
Ending solitary confinement would stop torture, save lives, and improve safety—not only for 122,000 people,
but for everyone.
CONCLUSION & RECOMMENDATIONS

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Calculating Torture

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May 2023

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NOTES
1
See, e.g., Lauren Brinkley-Rubinstein et al., “Association of Restrictive Housing During Incarceration with Mortality After Release,” JAMA
Network Open 2, no. 10 (October 4, 2019): e1912516, https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2752350; HALT Solitary
Campaign, The Walls Are Closing In on Me: Suicide and Self-Harm in New York State’s Solitary Confinement Units, 2015–2019, May 2020,
http://nycaic.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/The-Walls-Are-Closing-In-On-Me_For-Distribution.pdf.
2
See, e.g., U.S. Department of Justice, Report and Recommendations Concerning the Use of Restrictive Housing: Final Report, January
2016, 68, https://www.justice.gov/archives/dag/file/815551/download; Correctional Leaders Association and Arthur Liman Center for Public
Interest Law at Yale Law School, Time-In-Cell: A 2021 Snapshot of Restrictive Housing Based on a Nationwide Survey of U.S. Prison Systems,
August 2022, https://law.yale.edu/centers-workshops/arthur-liman-center-public-interest-law/liman-center-publications/time-cell-2021;
Freedom for Immigrants, Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project, Black Alliance for Just Immigration, and UndocuBlack Network, Uncovering the
Truth: Violence and Abuse Against Black Migrants in Immigration Detention, October 2022, https://www.freedomforimmigrants.org/reportuncovering-the-truth; New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, HALT Semi-annual Report, May–October
2022, October 2022, https://doccs.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2022/10/halt-semi-annual-report-2022-may-october.pdf.
3
Kayla James and Elena Vanko, The Impacts of Solitary Confinement (New York: Vera Institute of Justice, April 2021), https://www.
vera.org/downloads/publications/the-impacts-of-solitary-confinement.pdf. See, e.g., Stuart Grassian, “Psychiatric Effects of Solitary
Confinement,” Washington University Journal of Law & Policy 22 (January 2006): 325–383, https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cgi/
viewcontent.cgi?article=1362&context=law_journal_law_policy/.
4
Christopher Wildeman and Lars H. Andersen, “Solitary Confinement Placement and Post-release Mortality Risk Among Formerly
Incarcerated Individuals: A Population-Based Study,” Lancet Public Health 5, no. 2 (February 2020): e107–e113, https://www.sciencedirect.
com/science/article/pii/S2468266719302713.
5
Lew Blank, “A Bipartisan Majority of Voters Support Strongly Restricting Solitary Confinement, Including Placing a Four-Hour Limit on
the Practice,” Data for Progress, November 16, 2022, https://www.dataforprogress.org/blog/2022/11/16/a-bipartisan-majority-of-voterssupport-strongly-restricting-solitary-confinement-including-placing-a-four-hour-limit-on-the-practice; Unlock the Box Campaign,
Banning Torture: Legislative Trends and Policy Solutions for Restricting and Ending Solitary Confinement Throughout the United States,
January 2023, https://unlocktheboxcampaign.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/UTB-BanningTorture-TrendReport-January2023.pdf.

United States Bureau of Justice Statistics, Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities, 2019 (ICPSR38325), National Archive
of Criminal Justice Data, August 2022, https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR38325.v2; Laura M. Maruschak and Emily D. Buehler, Census of State and
Federal Adult Correctional Facilities, 2019: Statistical Tables (NCJ 301366), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau
of Justice Statistics, November 2021, https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/csfacf19st.pdf; Zhen Zeng and Todd D. Minton, Census of Jails,
2005–2019: Statistical Tables (NCJ 255406) U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics, October 2021,
https://bjs.ojp.gov/sites/g/files/xyckuh236/files/media/document/cj0519st.pdf; California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation,
Offender Data Points: Offender Demographics for the 24-Month Period Ending June 2019, prepared by the Office of Research, Division
of Internal Oversight and Research, June 2019, 8,  https://www.cdcr.ca.gov/research/wp-content/uploads/sites/174/2021/06/201906_
DataPoints.pdf; Virginia Department of Corrections, The Reduction of Restrictive Housing in the Virginia Department of Corrections: FY2019
Report, October 2019, 2, https://vadoc.virginia.gov/media/1452/vadoc-research-restrictive-housing-report-2019.pdf. As discussed further
on in this report, the estimates of the number of people in solitary confinement in jails rely on research and analysis conducted by the Vera
Institute of Justice. See Chase Montagnet, Jennifer Peirce, and David Pitts, Mapping U.S. Jails’ Use of Restrictive Housing: Trends, Disparities,
and Other Forms of Lockdown (New York: Vera Institute of Justice, April 2021), https://www.vera.org/downloads/publications/mapping-usjails-use-of-restrictive-housing.pdf.
6

7
Office of Inspector General, Department of Homeland Security, ICE Needs to Improve Its Oversight of Segregation Use in Detention
Facilities (OIG-22-01), October 2021, 10, https://www.oig.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/assets/2021-10/OIG-22-01-Oct21.pdf. Stop Solitary for
Kids, Not in Isolation: How to Reduce Room Confinement While Increasing Safety in Youth Facilities, June 2019, https://stopsolitaryforkids.
org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Not-In-Isolation-Final.pdf.
8
See, e.g., Ed Pilkington, “Nearly 50,000 People Held in Solitary Confinement in U.S., Report Says,” Guardian, August 24, 2022, https://www.
theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/24/us-solitary-confinement-prisons.
9
Both the Bureau of Justice Statistics and the Vera Institute of Justice used a definition of restrictive housing that required confinement
in a cell for 22 hours or more per day. The data for the two states whose independently reported data was relied upon for this report—
California and Virginia—did not specify the number of hours of cell confinement.

The given day for each facility was that day on which the facility reported. According to BJS, jurisdictions “were asked to report data
with a reference date of June 30, 2019” and “data collection spanned 9 months, from summer 2019 to spring 2020.” See Maruschak and
Buehler, Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities: Statistical Tables, 2019.
10

11
U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities, 2019. Of note, Delaware reported that it had
no individuals in solitary confinement; however, hundreds of incarcerated people from Delaware were (and continue to be) housed in
Pennsylvania prisons, including some in long-term restrictive housing. See Chris Barrish, “Delaware Confirms Move of Hundreds of Inmates
to Pennsylvania,” WHYY, November 7, 2018, https://whyy.org/articles/delaware-confirms-move-of-hundreds-of-inmates-to-pennsylvania/;
Josh Vaughn, “State Prison Inmates Mount Hunger Strike, Calling For End To Solitary Confinement,” Pennsylvania Capitol-Star, July 2, 2021,
https://levittownnow.com/2021/07/02/state-prison-inmates-mount-hunger-strike-calling-for-end-to-solitary-confinement/.
12
California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Offender Data Points, 2019, 8, https://www.cdcr.ca.gov/research/wp-content/
uploads/sites/174/2021/06/201906_DataPoints.pdf; Virginia Department of Corrections, The Reduction of Restrictive Housing in the Virginia
Department of Corrections 2019, 2.

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13
Montagnet, Peirce, and Pitts, Mapping U.S. Jails’ Use of Restrictive Housing. The Vera study, conducted in 2019-2020, is based on 		
survey responses submitted by 270 jurisdictions, which is 8.6 percent of the 3,146 jurisdictions contacted.

Zeng and Minton, Census of Jails, 2005–2019.

14

Correctional Leaders Association and Arthur Liman Center for Public Interest Law at Yale Law School, Time-In-Cell reports released
in 2022, 2020, 2018, and 2016, found at https://law.yale.edu/centers-workshops/arthur-liman-center-public-interest-law/liman-centerpublications/time-cell-2021.
15

16

Office of Inspector General, Department of Homeland Security, ICE Needs to Improve Its Oversight.

17

See Stop Solitary for Kids, “State Developments” on homepage, https://stopsolitaryforkids.org/.

A number of jurisdictions have claimed to end solitary while continuing solitary by another name. See Stephanie Wykstra, “Solitary
by Another Name,” The Progressive, October 7, 2021, https://progressive.org/magazine/solitary-by-another-name-wykstra/; Ned Oliver,
“Virginia Prison Officials Say They Eliminated Solitary Confinement; [Incarcerated People] Say They Just Gave It a New Name; ‘It’s All Very
Hannibal Lecter-ish,’” Virginia Mercury, January 14, 2019, https://www.virginiamercury.com/2019/01/14/virginia-prison-officials-say-theyeliminated-solitary-confinement-inmates-say-they-just-gave-it-a-new-name-its-all-very-hannibal-lecter-ish/; ACLU of Virginia,
“Virginia Department of Correction Elimination of ‘Restrictive Housing’ Is a Smokescreen,” July 22, 2021, https://acluva.org/en/pressreleases/virginia-department-corrections-elimination-restrictive-housing-smoke-screen; David Brand, “‘Solitary by Another Name’: NY
Lawmakers Slam City’s New Isolation Plan,” Queens Daily Eagle, April 28, 2021, https://queenseagle.com/all/solitary-by-another-nameny-lawmakers-slam-citys-new-isolation-plan; Katie Rose Quandt, “Massachusetts Department of Correction Gives a Lesson in How
to Get Around Solitary Confinement Reforms,” Solitary Watch, November 20, 2019, https://solitarywatch.org/2019/11/20/massachusettsdepartment-of-correction-gives-a-lesson-in-how-to-get-around-solitary-confinement-reforms/. In addition, Delaware reported to the
BJS in 2019 that it had no one in restrictive housing, despite continuing to hold individuals in their cells for up to 20.5 hours a day. See ACLU
of Delaware, “Solitary Confinement Ended as We Know It in Delaware,” February 20, 2017, https://www.aclu-de.org/en/press-releases/
solitary-confinement-ended-we-know-it-delaware.
18

19
As an example of how a snapshot in time does not capture the broader impact of the use of solitary confinement, a 2019 study of
New York state prisons found that while a few thousand people were in solitary confinement on any given day, the state’s prisons imposed
more than 38,000 sentences of solitary confinement in a single year. See New York Civil Liberties Union, Trapped Inside: The Past, Present,
and Future of Solitary Confinement in New York, October 2019, 9, https://www.nyclu.org/sites/default/files/field_documents/201910_
nyclu_solitary_web.pdf.
20
See, e.g., Akeem Browder and Melania Brown, “We Lost Our Siblings to Solitary Confinement. This Torture Must End Now,” Lohud. (USA
TODAY Network), July 2, 2021, https://www.lohud.com/story/opinion/2021/07/02/ny-solitary-confinement-must-end/7833664002/; Lauren
Brinkley-Rubinstein et al., “Association of Restrictive Housing During Incarceration with Mortality After Release,” JAMA Network Open 2,
no. 10 (October 4, 2019): e1912516, https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2752350.
21
Although it was seldom reflected in official numbers, Solitary Watch and Unlock the Box reported a spike in unofficial use of solitary
confinement through massive lockdowns in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. See Unlock the Box and Solitary Watch,
Solitary Confinement is Never the Answer, June 2020, https://unlocktheboxcampaign.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/UTB-Covid-19June2020Report.pdf. On incremental reductions since 2019, see New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision,
HALT Monthly Report November 2022, December 2022, https://doccs.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2022/12/halt-monthly-reportnovember-2022.pdf; New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, HALT Semi-annual Report. See also series of
articles on HALT Implementation, New York Focus, September–December 2022, https://www.nysfocus.com/halt-implementation/.
22

Correctional Leaders Association and Liman Center, Time-In-Cell, 2019.

23

Correctional Leaders Association and Liman Center, Time-In-Cell, 2021.

Correctional Leaders Association and Liman Center, Time-In-Cell, 2021. Of note, although the Time-In-Cell reports are often cited as
providing data on the total number of people in solitary confinement on a given day, in fact they document the number of people who
have been in prolonged solitary confinement for 15 continuous days or more (for an average of 22 hours or more a day).
24

25

Montagnet, Peirce, and Pitts, Mapping U.S. Jails’ Use of Restrictive Housing.

26

Unlock the Box Campaign, Banning Torture.

“The Biden Plan for Strengthening America’s Commitment to Justice,” https://joebiden.com/justice/#; “Kamala’s Plan to Transform
the Criminal Justice System and Re-envision Public Safety in America,” Medium, September 9, 2019, https://kamalaharris.medium.com/
kamalas-plan-to-transform-the-criminal-justice-system-and-re-envision-public-safety-in-america-f83a3d739bae. The President
and Vice President have yet to fulfill their promise, and solitary confinement in federal prisons has increased 29 percent since December
2015. See Erik Ortiz, “DOJ Report Outlines Steps to Limit Solitary Confinement in Prisons, As Its Use Only Increases Under Biden,” NBC News,
February 1, 2023, https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/doj-report-outlines-steps-limit-solitary-confinement-prisonsuse-only-rcna68384.
27

28

Blank, “Voters Support Restricting Solitary.”

Banning Solitary Confinement in City Jails, Int 0549-2022, New York City Council, introduced June 16, 2022, https://legistar.council.nyc.
gov/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=5698267&GUID=6F47F49A-06A3-444C-BBB7-3CBFF899DD84.
29

30

Unlock the Box Campaign, Banning Torture.

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THE BOX
TO END SOLITARY CONFINEMENT

solitarywatch.org

unlocktheboxcampaign.org

Solitary Watch works to uncover the truth
about solitary confinement and other harsh
prison conditions in the United States with
high-quality investigative journalism, accurate
information, and authentic storytelling from
both sides of prison walls. As a nonprofit
watchdog organization, Solitary Watch’s mission
is to generate public debate and inform policy
change on an underreported humanitarian
crisis by promoting awareness, creating
accountability, and shifting narratives.

The Unlock the Box Campaign is a coalition
of organizations and movement leaders who
partner with state and local campaigns across
the United States with the common goal of
ending the use of solitary confinement for all
people. Unlock the Box pursues this goal by
working simultaneously on national, state,
and local levels with solitary survivors, family
members, advocates, community and faith
groups, legislators, healthcare and corrections
experts, and others dedicated to ending statesponsored torture.

For more information, contact:
jcasella@solitarywatch.org.

For more information, contact:
jsandoval@unlocktheboxcampaign.org.

CONTRIBUTORS
Jean Casella and Alexandra Rivera, Solitary Watch
Jack Beck, Scott Paltrowitz, and Jessica Sandoval, Unlock the Box
Copyeditor: Romaine Perin
Design: Aaron Davis Design Studio
Cover drawing of solitary confinement cell at Northern Correctional Institution, Connecticut, by Carnell
Hunnicutt, Sr., used by permission of the artist. All cell drawings in this report appeared in the 2014
exhibition “Sentenced: Architecture and Human Rights,” organized by Architects/ Designers/ Planners
for Social Responsibility (ADPSR) at the UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design.
Copyright © 2023 by Solitary Watch and Unlock the Box

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