During the testimony of Patricia Coyne-Fague the director of the Rhode Island Department of Corrections (DOC), before the Rhode Island House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday evening, I spoke to a state representative in the overflow room.

“She’s a rock star,” said the Representative. “I wish we had a hundred more like her in state government.”

“Coyne-Fague?” I asked. “Did you know she didn’t take a step inside the prisons she oversees for over a year during Covid?” (See: During pandemic, RIDOC Director never visited correctional facilities under her supervision)

The Representative did not seem to believe me.

When UpriseRI reached out to Director Coyne-Fague about her extended absence from the prisons she oversees, she declined to be interviewed. This despite her testimony before the House Judiciary Committee where the Director said, “I’m always happy to meet with and talk with anyone.”

In truth, Director Coyne-Fague has steadfastly refused to meet with prison reform advocates, or the press, for years. When she started her testimony with the line, “I realize that there are probably a number of you that don’t know me” that’s because she has not, before this year, really been available to the public.

Director Coyne-Fague was testifying against H7760, The Restrictive Housing Act, which would place legal limits on the use of solitary confinement, what the DOC calls restrictive housing. During her testimony Director Coyne-Fague was steadfast in her complete opposition to a bill proponents say restricts a practice considered to be torture by the United Nations.

“I do not see room for common ground on this bill,” said Director Coyne-Fague under questioning from Representative Leonela Felix. “I’m not going to sugarcoat that.”

Below is the Director’s complete testimony. It has been edited for clarity.

DOC Director Patricia Coyne-Fague: I realize that there are probably a number of you that don’t know me so I I’d like to spend a small portion of my time giving you a little bit of background about myself. The Department of Corrections has provided this committee with a comprehensive letter that outlines all of our reasons for opposing this legislation, so my goal tonight is to provide you with an overview.

You may gain an impression of me as either someone who not only condones but actively advocates abuse, or as a clueless bureaucrat who has idea what her staff is doing. I assure you that I am neither. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m a lifelong Rhode Islander. I graduated from St. Mary’s Academy Bayview in East Providence. At Bayview the emphasis is on strong women. This philosophy coupled with my upbringing, which emphasized hard work and compassion for others, allowed me the confidence to seek a career in public service, where I could use my education and skills in a way that could give back to my community. And I was taught [that] of those to whom much is given much is required. I am proud to say I’m a graduate of Rhode Island College, earning a bachelor of arts degree with honors. I graduated from the New England School of Law and after passing the bar, I went to work as a criminal prosecutor in the office of the Attorney General.

I worked in district court and family court before being promoted to superior court in the Medicaid fraud control unit, patient abuse unit. There, I did extremely rewarding and often heartbreaking work prosecuting individuals charged with abuse, neglect, or mistreatment of nursing, home residents, hospital patients, and those suffering from developmental disabilities. The victims in those cases often had no one to speak for them. And I was their advocate. This January, I began my 23rd year at the Department of Corrections and it is where I have spent the bulk of my career in public service. In January, 2000. I was hired by then acting director A.T. Wall, a staff attorney coordinating the DOC’s legislative initiatives and response, as well as representing the department in civil litigation in state and federal court on all kinds of topics, including constitutional issues.

I assisted with policy development, litigated in mental health court, argued appeals before the state’s Supreme Court and the US Court of Appeals for the first circuit. I litigated contract and discipline cases through the labor and arbitration process, and many other duties. I have spent 23 years in and out of the ACI facilities on a regular basis at all hours of the day and night. In 2004, I was promoted to chief legal counsel and in 2012 Director Wall asked me to serve as Assistant Director for Administration, a position I held until his retirement in 2018. In 2019, I was appointed by governor Raimondo and unanimously confirmed by the Senate as Rhode Island’s first female Director of Corrections. The authority and tremendous responsibilities of the Director of Corrections are spelled out in Rhode Island General Laws 42:56:10. Every aspect of staff and offender management is delineated in that statute.

The legislation before you would significantly impair my ability to fulfill my obligations under that statute while nevertheless assigning me responsibility for them. I take those responsibilities very seriously. I am guided every day by the knowledge that every offender under our supervision is somebody’s child, sibling, spouse, parent, or loved one. Regardless of the crimes they’ve committed, they’re human beings and we treat them as such. We do not torture people. The ACI bears little resemblance to what you see in television programs or movies, and frankly, some of what has might be described here tonight. Every time I take someone on a tour of our facilities, the first comment they make is that it wasn’t what they thought it would be. It’s so clean. It’s so quiet. It feels safe. The ACI has come a long way from the days of federal court oversight in terms of care, custody and control.

I have toured the ACI with members of this general assembly, three governors, other elected officials, cabinet members, judges, and professionals, and national experts. All have been impressed by the professionalism of the staff and the cleanliness and order of the facilities.

Judges determine who is sent to us and for how long. We cannot refuse anyone. And we have no part to play in whether or for how long anyone is incarcerated. For most inmates in our custody, the trauma, economic, and social factors that may have led to their incarceration occurred long before they crossed threshold into our custody. Realizing there are societal and personal circumstances that are beyond our control we do everything we can to help those in our charge and prepare them for release while meeting our mission of public safety. Unfortunately, not everyone who comes to us finds it easy to conform, in general population, to the rules of the ACI.

The rules are meant to keep everyone safe – staff, other imates, and members of the public – who rely on us. [If] the deterrent value of disciplinary confinement [is removed], as this legislation would do, inmates will have little incentive to follow the rules. People will get hurt or worse – including other inmates who rely on us to keep them safe. Without a system to provide order to those that would break our rules, inmates will be forced to take matters into their own hands and protect themselves. The resulting anarchy will transport the ACI back into the 1970s when lawlessness reigned inside the ACI [and] assaults and escape were commonplace. [It] ultimately resulted in costly litigation and federal court control.

References to solitary confinement, SEG, or the hole are meant to evoke visions of the ACI as prisons are depicted in the movies, but the dark dirt floor box Andy Dufresne was held in on the whim of a corrupt warden in The Shawshank Redemption bears no resemblance to the process afforded to ACI inmates who break the rules, nor the conditions the inmate lives in even while being sanctioned for those violations.

I’ve asked two individuals, Warden Lynn Corey, and our director of clinical behavioral, Caitlin Bouchard, to tell you in some detail about the reality of life at the ACI restrictive housing provision of due process, care of those struggling with mental illness and sound correctional practice. [Those testimonies are included in the video at the bottom of this page.] They are two of the corrections experts I am proud to call my colleagues, recognizing that we are in the midst of federal court litigation on these issues. We may be limited in what we can discuss in detail, but I am sure the committee will find their expertise informative. I once again encourage any legislator who questions whether what we are saying is true to come and see for themselves. The level of transparency I am offering, and willingness to invite you to tour our facilities, should speak volumes about the level of confidence I have in the way the DOC is run [and] for which I am ultimately responsible.

The testimony [from advocates] you you will hear tonight is sure to be emotional, and while it is not my intention to discount or diminish anyone’s personal experiences, it must be stated that having been incarcerated does not convert one into a corrections expert. Similarly, testimony related to terms of incarceration or employment at the ACI which occurred 5, 10, 20, or more years ago is not a fair description of the department as it exists and is run today. The DOC has evolved and continues to evolve.

We have listened and continue to do so, but I cannot support legislation that I and other corrections experts see as posing an unacceptable risk to the safety and security of inmates, staff and the public. And I respectfully ask this committee does not either. I’d like to make three short points on based on some prior testimony.

First of all, we have increased out of cell time. Would I like to increase out-of-cell time more? Absolutely. I don’t have the staff, plain and simple. We have a large contingent of correction staff who are eligible to retire in the next three years, so this staffing situation is frankly only going to get worse. Recruitment is a challenge. If you’ve seen any of the finance hearings – Colonel Manni, myself, anyone in law enforcement – struggles to recruit right now. We have a very small class sitting right now. It’s not going to make a dent. So it’s not an unwillingness to increase out-of-cell time. I simply don’t have the staff to accommodate that.

After the 2017 commission on restrictive housing, [Note: the actual commission called the practice “solitary confinement” not restrictive housing] we developed and implemented a unit at the high security center called the residential treatment unit. Iit is a very small unit at high security. I invite you to come see it for yourself. Inmates who struggle to survive in general population due to mental illness are treated in a very intensive program that has been quite successful. We have an occupational therapist who works with them…. We did that with $0 allocated because it was the right thing to do.

I recently brought a Senator through that unit and she noticed that there was a yard outside the door. Inmates in high security recreate in a courtyard that is cement. The Senator asked, Why can’t they touch grass? And so I asked, Why can’t they tell much grass? Well, they couldn’t touch grass because the area that we would use it for hadn’t been used in a long time and there are some improvements that need to be made to the security of that area in order to allow high security inmates to recreate outside. We are making those improvements because it’s the right thing to do.

Finally, in terms of programming for inmates in this situation, the DOC, in the governor’s budget, is seeking the use of ARPA funds to implement a wifi system, which will allow increased programming for inmates with mental to illness, for inmates in restrictive housing, for inmates who cannot handle the rigors of a classroom, so that they can have programming available to them in that way. Because we know it’s important. Because we know, with rare exceptions, that everyone is getting out someday, and we take that obligation incredibly seriously. I’m very happy to answer any questions that the committee may have.

Representative Arthur Corvese (Democrat, District 55, North Providence): Thank you, director. This is the first time I’ve heard you speak and you’ve articulated your position. I’m sure we’re going to hear additional testimony, both pro and con, articulated very well this evening. Contrary to what some people may think about the individuals who occupy this place, we try to be fair and try to keep an open mind on this. I believe Representative Felix had mentioned a number of other states that have instituted, if not the exact, then similar legislation to that before us. Simply put, what makes Rhode Island different than those other states?

Coyne-Fague: There’s a very small number of states nationwide that are ‘unified systems.’ Rhode Island is one of them. What that means is we are a combination of jail and prison. Most other states have county jails and they also have prison. Prison is where your sentenced, jail is where you generally serve a short sentence or await trial. We’re different in that way. We’re a very small system. Rhode Island is a very small state. There’s only one degree of separation in between any two people in Rhode Island. And that makes management of an offender population particularly challenging in a way that maybe it isn’t in Montana.

For example, I can tell you that some states have implemented some of these changes as a result of lawsuits. I’ve read some of these lawsuit settlements and have noted that a lot of the things that other states have agreed to in settlement of those lawsuits are things that we are already doing.

We are concerned that when the scale tips too far, it takes away our ability to keep everyone safe. I know Warden Corey is going to discuss this. As an example, there is a facility that the state no longer owns. It’s called the Donald Price Medium Security Facility. You can see it off the highway. It was a medium security prison named after Donald Price, who was a 23-year-old correctional officer murdered by an inmate. And so they named a prison facility after him. The inmate that murdered Donald Price stabbed an officer at maximum security in 2019. I remember it was because it was CO (Correctional Officer) Week and I went over right after he was stabbed. The inmate when he stabbed this officer told us that it was his intention to take another one out before he died. H Was over 70 years old. Under this legislation, he would do 15 days.

This was an inmate already serving a life sentence. 15 days is not enough of a deterrent. For an inmate who is 21 years old, who wants to murder a rival gang member or sexually assault someone, 15 days is not a deterrent. It’s all we have. If you allow an inmate to take all of his or her possessions with him or her into confinement without losing any of their privileges, that’s not a deterrent. It’s like sending your kid to his room when he has a state of the art video game console in there. We have very few tools for the management. Many other prison systems have multiple facilities of each classification, so if they have a problem in maximum, they have another maximum that they can spread their inmates out into. I have one. I have one high security, one maximum, one medium, one minimum, one women’s and one jail. And so within those confines, I think Rhode Island is very different. What might work for Montana, I submit, isn’t the same here. I have people with decades of corrections experience telling me this could be very, very bad and very, very dangerous. And when I refer to the obligations that this assembly requires of me in 42:56:10, I can’t support it.

Rep Corvese: Let me make one quick comment. You had referenced the 1970s and the condition of the ACI. The 1970s as compared to today, there is a difference in the ACI and there is a difference in those individuals who are committing crimes. Things were a little different in the seventies than they are now.

Representative Leonela Felix (Democrat, District 61, Pawtucket): In your testimony you talked about being able to use restrictive housing for inmates who may be problematic and as a way to confine them and as a way of punishing them. Do you have data in terms of how solitary confinement or restrictive housing has helped in terms of achieving those goals?

Coyne-Fague: First of all, it’s not that we are having trouble managing someone. We have a very comprehensive disciplinary policy which is written as informed by United States Supreme Court case law. Our disciplinary process for inmates in our custody provides more due process than the United States Supreme Court requires. And there are many layers of that disciplinary process. So it’s not one officer who has a beef with an inmate saying, ‘That’s it, you’re you’re in the hole.’ It doesn’t work that way. There’s an entire process. There’s an appeal process. There’s a review process after the person is sanctioned to disciplinary confinement where their disciplinary time can be suspended…

If someone’s discipline is motivated or caused in some way by the struggles they’re having with mental illness, our policy addresses that as well. Every day our mental health staff, per policy, reviews the list of inmates who have been placed in disciplinary confinement the day before. And they review that list to see if there’s anyone that they know to be already under treatment and then they can intervene. That discipline time can be suspended because obviously, if someone is acting out as a result of their rmental illness, that disciplinary confinement is not going to have an impact on them or their future behavior, which is the point of disciplinary confinement. Since the revisions – as a result of the commission in 2017 – the list of offenses that can expose an inmate to up to a year in restrictive disciplinary confinement has been greatly reduced.

It used to be, when I started working there 23 years ago. You could get a year 30 days at a time, and it would exceed your prison term. I watched men leave high security segregation to the street because they were done with their sentence. That’s not a good way to manage an offender who’s going back to his community. We know that. We don’t do that. So only the most serious offenses expose an offender to what we call long term disciplinary confinement. We find that future good behavior – while in disciplinary confinement – they’re incentivized because that time can be suspended and they’re released from that disciplinary confinement. But in order to have a deterrent effect, especially on those most violent offenses, usually against another inmate, it’s an important management tool.

Rep Felix: Sure. Thank you, but back to my question is there data from Rhode Island that shows that by implementing solitary confinement or restrictive housing housing, it actually changes an inmate’s behavior for the better?

Coyne-Fague: What I can show you is historical data that once we had a disciplinary policy, once we left the wild west of the 1970s and had a disciplinary policy that provided real process to inmates and real ability for them to correct their behavior and be rewarded for that – by having that time suspended – the level of violence in our facilities declined. The number of incidents has declined. So over time, yeah, I mean, I can get you the data, but if you looked at a graph, you’re going to see the level of violence in our prisons, markedly declining from a time when there there weren’t these methods in place, and that’s why we are one of the safest prison systems in the country.

Not because we keep people all locked up in cells all the time and they never get out and cause trouble, but because there’s a very clear process. There are numerous avenues of grievance for inmates who feel they have been mistreated, or that we didn’t follow our own policy. I think it’s a much more professional, cognizant type of system than it used to be. Certainly over AT Walls tenure, as the longest serving director in the country, there was a real shift to a culture change even among our staff that while public safety is our number one mission, and it’s always going to be our number one mission, that it’s a dual mission, because we do recognize that everyone, with rare exceptions, is getting out and going back to their communities. And those are our communities too. So we want to be able to do what we can do to give them the tools to succeed when we get out. So yes, public safety, but, rehab is a huge portion of what we do every single day.

Rep Felix: I appreciate that because as you mentioned, they’re coming back to all of our communities, right? All of our neighbors deserve to be treated with dignity, because we’re not our worst mistakes, right? They deserve the opportunity to be treated humanely and with dignity. My concern is that all of the things that you have stated are based on policies that the DOC has implemented. You’ve been there for 23 years, you will probably be there for a while. But whoever comes next may decide that those policies are not correct. And it seems to me, based on everything that you’re saying, that these reforms that you have done have caused positive effects. So what is it that you need from the legislature in order to implement these or other reforms that will positively impact the lives, particularly those who have been put in restrictive housing?

Coyne-Fague: What I’m concerned about is that if you read 42:56:10, and you read that really comprehensive list of all the responsibilities that DOC has to its staff, to the public and to the offenders in its custody, as well as on probation and parole, that within that framework, there is room to evolve. There is room to adapt to evolving correctional practices and best practices. When you try to carve something into law, you completely stymie and stunt the ability of the department to continue that evolution. I think that the powers of the director already cover what needs to be done. Now, if I win Powerball this week and I’m on a beach somewhere and a new director comes in and throws all of this out the window. There’s a remedy for that.

I’m very afraid of the risk posed by carving into legislation – carving into law – aspects of prison management that really do tie the hands of the director and the prison responsible for the lives of the people in their custody while still giving them the responsibility. It’s like you’re taking my tools away, but you’re still putting me in charge of making sure the house stands. I believe that under the current law on the books, the powers of the director allow for the evolution that needs to happen, without this legislation. I find portions of this legislation, frankly, extremely dangerous.

Rep Felix: Do you happen to know when that statue was implemented into law?

Coyne-Fague: 1976.

Rep Felix: That’s very long time ago.

Coyne-Fague: Well, it’s been amended amended a number of times and the last time it was amended was in 2019. But it really does cover everything. And as I said, it allows for the evolution necessary. Let me use maximum security as an example. Two years after Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, maximum security opened. It’s 140 years old. It was not designed for modern correctional practices. We do the very best we can. You could literally eat off the floor and you could eat off the floor, not because I’m going to clean the floor….

[Laughter from those in attendance.]

Coyne-Fague: You know what? I’ll be respectful when others testify. And I don’t think it’s a lot for me to ask…

Representative Jason Knight (Democrat, District 67, Barrington, Warren): Ladies and gentlemen, this doesn’t work unless everyone respects everyone who’s at the lectern. So whoever’s up there, we’re going to be quiet and listen to them. I ask you to do the same for this witness.

Coyne-Fague: And it wouldn’t be putting on a show for you. That’s the way it is. But it’s really old. Would I love to have a situation where we could have a facility that really allows us to do all of the things that we know we should and could be doing if we had the resources? Absolutely.

Rep Felix: Thank you for your testimony. I really appreciate your insight and your positions in terms of the discretion and tying the hands. The DOC is no different than any other body that we as the legislature, particularly the Judiciary Committee, have passed legislation to reform. We talk about bail reform and we talk about other legislation that impacts the criminal justice system that the judges see as tying their hand – but in some instances it is important for us, as this body, to take those risks and do that because we’ve seen that the system as it is right now does not work for everyone. It’s important for us to keep an open mind and try to figure out how we work together to ensure that we pass legislation that’s meaningful because I disagree that only with policy we are going to get there.

The other thing that advocates have been trying to have a meeting with you and others from the DOC in terms of talking about this legislation, and there has been no response.

Coyne-Fague: Respectfully, Rep, I disagree. I have had numerous email exchanges with you, as have members of my staff. I have given every member of this committee a hand delivered invitation to come and tour the prison. I am touring the prison next week with a number of members of the Senate. I am open and I’m easy to find.

Rep Felix: I’m not saying that about me. You probably will answer my emails. But I’m saying, from my conversations with community advocates – members of the coalition – these folks have been asking for meetings prior to me even taking up this bill, and have not received a response. So my question to you, on the record with the committee, is, are you willing to meet with myself and the committee and the members of the coalition to talk and discuss this bill in particular to see where can we find common ground?

Coyne-Fague: I’m always happy to meet with and talk with anyone. I do not see room for common ground on this bill. I’m not going to sugarcoat that. And the reason for that is the risk involves people’s actual lives and other inmates are counting and their families are counting on us to keep them safe. So if I see something as my responsibility, as director, that I believe poses an unreasonable risk to the safety and lives of the people that I am charged with maintaining, thenI do not find room for compromise on that. That said, I’m happy to sit with anyone and talk with them about reforms that we can affect, because I think there’s always room for improvement in any system, whether it’s DEM or the DOC there’s always room. We don’t have all the answers. We don’t know everything. I’m not going to say that. But what I cannot commit to you is that I think that there’s room for compromise in this legislation.

Rep Felix: I look forward to working with you and the members of the coalition in terms of finding common ground. It doesn’t mean that I’m not going to continue to fight for this bill because, as we’ve seen in other jurisdictions, this is something that has worked, that I can see working here, despite your concerns and what you’re saying. We’ve seen in other jurisdictions how it’s actually improved safety and wellbeing for inmates.

Representative Camille Vella-Wilkinson (Democrat, District 21, Warwick): Could you please walk me through what progressive discipline looks like at the ACI, where it ends at solitary?

Coyne-Fague: There are all different kinds of rules, different kinds of severity. Some are meant to simply keep the place ticking, keep the place running in an orderly way. Making sure that we know that we have everyone. We start out the day with so things like you have to stand up for the count. We count the inmates numerous times a day. It’s the most important thing we do. So all movement stops in the facility while the inmates are counted, you have to stand. If you’re in your cell and it’s during the day, you have to stand for the count because we need to know that you’re a living, breathing body.

If you don’t feel like standing for the count that day, and the officer tells you need to stand for the count and you disobey the officer, you could be subject to discipline. Now you will probably be subject to a warning and that’s usually sufficient. You could opt for something called a two nighter where you don’t have a disciplinary hearing. You agree to take basically two nights without privileges. You’re going to lose your privileges. Maybe you’ll be fed in your cell rather than going to the dining room. There’s kind of like spectrum of punishments and it’s based on the severity of the offense. So no one is going to long term restrictive housing because they failed to stand for the count.

Our policies spell it out very clearly – these offenses will get you up to 15 days. These offenses will get you up to 30 days, and so on. If an offense exposes the inmate to long term segregation, long term restrictive housing in disciplinary confinement, there is an opportunity, first of all, for an appeal to the decision of the disciplinary board to the warden. If the disciplinary confinement term is longer than 90 days there are automatic reviews. First, there’s a requested review that the inmate can ask for. After that, there’s an automatic review, whether the inmate requested or not. After the initial offense, if the behavior is such that the inmate is behaving and following the rules, that time can be suspended by the warden. That’s a relatively new aspect of our policy that wasn’t in place 10 years ago, because as I said, we have learned, we evolve. We look to see what works.

It’s not it’s not helpful, trying to manage a prison, keeping people locked up all the time. It’s not something we want to do it. It’s not a good thing. It’s not good for them. It’s not good for the officers. It’s better to have people functioning in population, taking programs, working at jobs. We try to be the least restrictive that we can, but it has to be based on the offense. So the gentleman that I described earlier, who stabbed the correctional officer in maximum, he got a disciplinary term, I believe of 364 or 365 days, but he was reviewed continually.

As I say, inmates who either already had mental illness or seem to be developing mental illness have frequent access to our mental health clinicians. We have a large contingent of inmates who suffeedr from mental illness before they came to us and some after they came to us. We are referred to as the largest mental health facility in the state, and that’s really unfortunate. We take that ery seriously to heart, so the provision of mental health services at the ACI has changed dramatically, even over my tenure there, from what it used to be.

Rep Vella-Wilkinson: There is a bill that is coming through the system up here at the general assembly that talks about mental health intervention. Hopefully that will also have a direct, positive impact on life at the ACI.

Coyne-Fague: And we are very supportive of that legislation.

Rep Vella-Wilkinson: There’s no delicate way of putting this. I’m not trying to disrespect you by saying this. What is a proper term for, the the incarcerated inmate? I want to make sure I’m not offending anyone.

Coyne-Fague: There’s a lot of different terms and I’m a member of an organization comprised of all the directors and sometimes they’re commissioners or secretaries, they’re called different things nationwide. And I recently kind of put out a survey to all of my peers to asking, What do you call them? because I’ve seen that term change over time. Even since I’ve been there it used to be acceptable to call them prisoners. We don’t call them prisoners. Generally we use the word ‘offender’ because our policies are generally written and they can have applications. to both people incarcerated at the ACI and people in the community on home confinement or probation and parole. So offender is sort of a catchall. We do use inmate. Some other states use other terms. There doesn’t seem to be a universal term. There are terms that are coming that are not really prevalent nationwide that I have heard others use, ‘formally incarcerated person,’ ‘person experiencing incarceration’ We say inmate.

Rep Vella-Wilkinson: Once the offender has done has committed some type of an action that lands him or her into solitary, are they left to serve their time or they be screwed with while they’re in confinement?

Coyne-Fague: I’m not sure I know what you mean by ‘screwed with.’

Rep Vella-Wilkinson: Well, some of the things that I’ve heard, quite frankly, I found alarming. I mean the fact that they’re freezing their asses off, excuse me, I don’t mean to be rude, but they’re freezing their asses off in there. They’re not being given a blanket. I’m assuming that’s because of fear of them hanging themselves or something of that nature. That they’re in a completely bright room the entire time that they’re there, so it’s very difficult for them to sleep. That the only thing that they’re really able to hear is the screams of another incarcerated person… I could imagine what it would be like if I was locked in such a small confining room, freezing, screaming people around me, light blaring in my face. How are they supposed to be able to get any type of decent frame of mind so that they could petition to go back to general population or wherever it was that they came from?

Coyne-Fague: I’d be happy to answer that and I think that’s a fair question, given some of the testimony that was presented to House Finance the other night. First of all, I’m a broken record. Please come see it, please come see. What you will see is a number of factors. First of all, what you will see is a staff that is governed by a code of ethics and conduct that is very strictly enforced. We have a code of ethics and conduct. It’s written. I’d be happy to give you a copy of it. Every single person that works or volunteers or provides services in any way at the ACI is governed by the code of ethics and conduct. I have an internal affairs unit staffed by law enforcement experts, as well as former correctional officers, who’ve worked their way up. In fact, my chief inspector is here this evening who investigates any and all allegations of staff misconduct. So staff screwing with an inmate, first of all, doesn’t go unnoticed would be very unlikely to remain unreported and would get thoroughly investigated and punished.

I have fired quite a number of people since I’ve been director. It’s not something I like to do. In fact, I think it’s the worst part of my job, but I do it because it really interferes with the reputation and the professionalism of rest of that department. And I think one of the things that I have heard people comment on who have come through, various officials and professionals of all kinds, is that it’s never what they think it’s going to be. And one of the aspects of that is the staff. These are very professional men and women. They are sworn law enforcement. They go through a 12 week, very, very intensive training program, and they take an oath of office, which is enforced through that code of ethics and conduct.

We struggle with our physical plant, as I said, maximum’s 140 years old. Ventilation is an issue. When the heat breaks in one of our facilities, which if it’s going to break, it’s going to break in February, or the air conditioning breaks, it breaks in July. We don’t let people sit alone, shivering in their cells. We make sure that they have what they need, whether it’s extra clothing, whether it’s extra blankets, what have you, we have a number of cells in maximum security right now that are unusable because they have plumbing issues or heating issues or physical issues where they’re literally disintegrating. We don’t put inmates in those cells. It’s not in our interest to torment an inmate that way. Maybe back in the day, maybe back when the federal court had to step in, that was the way of life at the ACI. And I’m here to tell you it’s not anymore

Rep Vella-Wilkinson: My very last question is, What is the maximum amount of time per day that someone is kept in solitary? Are they kept 22, 23 hours a day?

Coyne-Fague: It depends on the facility and it depends on the mod and that’s a function of our staffing. It can be up to 22 hours. I would like it to be fewer. As I said, I really struggle with staffing because it would be all well and good to throw open the cells and say, ‘Okay, everybody can come out now,’ but that may not be safe for everyone. And number one always has to be ‘How do we do this safely?’ Everything has to be done safely.

Rep Corvese: Do you have surveillance through all the facility?

Coyne-Fague: Yes.

Rep Corvese: By that you mean video surveillance? And who monitors that?

Coyne-Fague: There is a security specialist that is assigned. There’s one assigned to each of our facilities and they are overseen by a chief of security. That is staff that monitors footage and preserves, when needed, that footage. There are psychiatric cells and intake where each cell is individually surveilled via camera and is monitored live by the officers depending on the inmate’s status. If the inmate is at extreme risk of suicide, that is someone that is monitored continually by staff. So it sort of depends, but generally, yes, the entire complex.

Rep Corvese: Are the individuals who monitor the system on site?

Coyne-Fague: Yes. You have state employees. They’re members of the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers. And they’ve received specialized training in various security methods.

Rep Corvese: How long do you keep the video?

Coyne-Fague: It depends. Some of the video, after a while it gets written over as part of the system that runs it. If they there’s a need for it, if there’s been an incident and we need that footage, it can be preserved.

Representative Jose Batista (Democrat, District 12, Providence): I can appreciate that you have a difficult role. I say that as somebody who is a defense attorney and who spends my career trying to get people out of the prison system. There’s a number of things I’d love to talk to you about, and I’ll take you up on your invitation and would love to have a longer conversation.

Coyne-Fague: You mentioned a scenario in your testimony where an inmate killed an officer at your prison and obviously that is the most tragic thing that could happen. It should never happen. And I’m sorry for the loss in the department. You also use that example to say that 15 days in restrictive housing would not be a deterrent. I’m not going to beat around the nush. I wonder, how do you calculate what would be a sufficient amount of days to be a deterrent, because it’s kind of hard to prove, right? What is the longest amount of time that somebody can be in this type of housing? You said it was 22 hours per day, but how many days?

Coyne-Fague: 365 days.

Rep Batista: That is the longest somebody can be in there.

Coyne-Fague: Yes.

Rep Batista: I’m not a scientist, I’m an attorney. I personally struggle with the idea that this sort of punishment more of a deterrent than it is to already be in prison.

Coyne-Fague: What I can tell you is, and I’ve heard this from my colleagues in other states. In fact, we asked some of the other states who have had similar legislation proposed what their reaction has been, what their experience has been. What I can tell you is that some have seen an uptick in assaults. Some inmates talk and they talk to the staff because that’s who they’re with all day. So some inmates in other systems have told officers that 15 days is totally worth it for what I want to do. If I want to kill a rival gang member? Yeah. Okay. Fine. 15 days. Because you’re dealing with some of the people that would be excluded from disciplinary confinement under this legislation, the very youthful offenders who don’t have a lot of impulse control, who don’t have a long vision toward consequences.

15 days is nothing compared to their goal, you know? And we hear that. My colleagues in other systems have told me that they’ve heard that from the inmates. It’s one thing to know that if I have my girlfriend, when she visits me, convey fentanyl into this facility, if I get caught, I’m going to lose visits for a long time. I’m going to lose my job. I’m going to not be able to participate in programming. I’m going to lose good time. And good time is the the gold standard. That’s a deterrent. Anything that takes away those tools? Now I’ve got a free for all on my hands. And that’snot just dangerous for staff, it’s dangerous for other inmates who really are relying on us to help keep them safe.

The percentage of people in disciplinary confinement at the prison is very small, but like any society, most people obey the law, right? Most people follow the rules in any classroom, in any endeavor, any business, right? There’s always a handful that are a problem. That’s what I deal with too. I need that to deterrent effect. Otherwise there’s no incentive to behave. And if people don’t feel like we are keeping them safe, they feel like they need to do what they need to do to keep themselves safe. And that’s when mayhem ensues.

Rep Batista: I’m particularly concerned about the intake center. Last I checked the total and this is a couple years ago, so please correct me if I’m wrong, total prison population, between men and women was somewhere north of 3000 people.

Coyne-Fague: The total prison population as of midnight last night was 2,120 and that’s 53.1% of our capacity. Our population has dropped significantly.

Rep Batista: Of the 2120, how many are in intake, approximately?

Coyne-Fague: 760, which is 66.2% of the capacity at intake.

Rep Batista: It’s also about one third of the total prison population. Do you have any sense of those people in intake? How frequently those people end up in restrictive housing versus the rest of the population? Does that happen often? Is it rare?

Coyne-Fague: We did a snapshot of our population on March 31st. That day there were 767 inmates in the intake service center. 0%, on that day, were in administrative confinement. Eight inmates, which is 1.04% of the population at intake, was in disciplinary confinement

Rep Batista: The reason why I’m picking out intake is because a lot of the folks who areat intake are people who have not been convicted of crimes yet. People who haven’t even been convicted, now they’re not only in prison, but also in the worst kind of it. When we have another conversation, I’d love to discuss more about that.

Representative Carol Hagan McEntee (Democrat, District 33, South Kingstown, Narragansett): I concur with Rep Vella-Wilkinson about the 22 hours. Depending on how many days they’re in solitary confinement, 22 hours in a given day would definitely drive you crazy.

Coyne-Fague: Could I interrupt for one second? I don’t want to be overly involved in semantics, and I know that there’s lots of different terms for lots of the things that we’re talking about, but solitary confinement by definition includes the aspect of zero meaningful human contact. That is not the case for people currently in restrictive housing. That’s why you never hear me say solitary confinement. While I agree that it’s probably not pleasant I can tell you that these facilities are clean, people are not shivering, freezing, sweating. On those days when the stuff is broken, we deal with it. We bring in fans, we give extra blankets, whatever. But it’s not like the movies.

Here’s video of Representative Felix introducing her bill:

Here’s the video of everyone else who testified on the Restrictive Housing Act:

Coming soon…