Even if an inmate's sentence is not oppressively long, their treatment while incarcerated can still constitute subhuman treatment. Prisons are not medical facilities, but they regularly are forced to deal with mental health problems and care for elderly and terminally ill inmates. Food, if it's even edible, usually lacks enough nutrition for inmates' health to not deteriorate. Plus, with a lack of opportunities to see family, read, or gain skill sets, inmates are placed in buildings which lack any resemblance of the civilized world.
“In New York prisons, inmates are required to pay for phone calls, stamps and items from the commissary. The last pay raise in New York was approved by then-Gov. Mario Cuomo more than 25 years ago. The legislative sponsors are also calling for a commission to conduct a study examining the cost as well as any benefits of increasing the minimum wage for inmates.“
Albany Times Union
August 27, 2019
Read More“Between January 2011 and May 2018, 675 elder New Yorkers and more than 1,000 people of all ages have died in a New York state prison. Over the last 20 years, the number of incarcerated older New Yorkers has more than doubled, from 4,706 to greater than 10,000. Yet the state's overall prison population has fallen by 30 percent.“
Albany Times Union
March 30, 2019
Read More"But for both the city and state, there's a larger moral issue: Upstate jails are essentially becoming the city's "black sites," similar to the federal government's practice after the 2001 terror attacks to send prisoners overseas to get around U.S. laws prohibiting torture in interrogation."
Albany Times Union
August 5, 2018
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