One prisoner’s fight to end solitary confinement

FILE - This Jan. 28, 2016 file photo shows a solitary confinement cell at New York City's Riker's Island jail. On Thursday, March 31, 2016, a federal judge approved a sweeping plan to reduce solitary confinement in New York state prisons. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, File)
A solitary confinement cell at New York City's Rikers Island jail, seen on January 28, 2016 [Bebeto Matthews/AP/File]

In a Texas maximum security prison, Dennis Wayne Hope has served 27 years in solitary confinement – more than half of his life. On any given night in the United States, more than 120,000 prisoners are isolated just like him. United Nations experts have strongly urged a global ban on solitary confinement that lasts more than 15 days, denouncing it as a form of psychological torture. Today, the story of how Hope set out to change that and what it says about prison in the United States.

In this episode: 

  • Rhana Natour (@RNatourious), correspondent for Al Jazeera’s Fault Lines.

Episode credits:

This episode was produced by Khaled Soltan and our host, Kevin Hirten, standing in for Malika Bilal. Miranda Lin fact-checked this episode.

Our sound designer is Alex Roldan. Our lead of audience development and engagement is Aya Elmileik. Munera AlDosari and Adam Abou-Gad are our engagement producers.

Alexandra Locke is The Take’s executive producer, and Ney Alvarez is Al Jazeera’s head of audio.

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Source: Al Jazeera

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