for The New York Times: New York Prisons Accused of Defying Judge on Solitary Confinement by José A. Alvarado Jr.

News

for The New York Times: New York Prisons Accused of Defying Judge on Solitary Confinement

josé a. alvarado jr.

Sep 17, 2025

Summary

The illegal practices continued despite a judge’s order last year that corrections officials follow state law on the issue, a civil liberties group said in a court filing.

A year after a judge found that New York State prisons were holding prisoners in solitary confinement illegally by failing to meet state requirements for doing so, the practice continues, according to a court filing on Monday.

The filing, by the New York Civil Liberties Union, stems from a 2023 lawsuit in which the group accused state corrections officials of adopting an internal policy meant to help them bypass legal limits on how long prisoners can be held in solitary confinement.

Last year, Justice Kevin R. Bryant of State Supreme Court in Albany ordered prison officials to comply with a requirement that they justify any extension to a prisoner’s solitary confinement. He also ruled that decisions about solitary confinement made according to the internal policy rather than to the law were “null and void.”

In its filing on Monday, however, the civil liberties group said the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision had upheld nearly 2,000 extended disciplinary confinement sanctions made before the judge’s order after reviewing them. The department, the filing says, “continues to adhere to the very practices this court rejected.”

Photographed for The New York Times, with words by Hurubie Meko

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/18/nyregion/new-york-prisons-solitary-confinement-illegal.html

José A. Alvarado Jr.

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