Jerry Metcalf describes suicide watch in prison, including solitary confinement, Bam-Bam cells, degrading conditions, and what suicidal prisoners say about the experience.
In federal prisons, when a prisoner is deemed suicidal, they are tossed into solitary confinement for observation. In Michigan, where I’m currently being housed in a medium-security facility, the process is no different. Both the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP) and Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) employ prisoner volunteers to do the observing, and for the past 11 years I’ve been one of those volunteers.
We’re called Prisoner Observation Aides (POAs). And while you might be wondering why anyone in their right mind would ever allow one prisoner to watch another in such a situation, the answer is simple: Prisoners relate to other prisoners. Years ago, the FBOP realized that when they used prison guards to watch a suicidal prisoner, a very high percentage of those prisoners still went on to kill themselves later. But when one prisoner was used to watch another, the future suicide rate dropped significantly.
The upside of being a POA is that I get to help other convicts in their most dire time of need. The downside is that I’m forced to witness the way these men are mentally, emotionally, and physically abused while being housed in solitary confinement. Their treatment is horrible. So horrible, in fact, that most prisoners hide the fact that they’re feeling suicidal. To deal with their downward spiral, these desperate souls often turn to less-than-desirable tactics like self-medication, self-mutilation, and just plain old suffering it out.
What Suicide Watch in Prison Looks Like
When a man ends up in solitary confinement on suicide watch, he’s first locked into a dank, dark shower stall reeking of urine. He’s left standing (possibly for hours) until one of the guards finds the time to strip him out of his prison uniform. I’ll be sitting outside that shower stall with a clipboard and a government form that I use to take notes of the suicidal prisoner’s actions, disposition, and emotional state.
After the prisoner’s clothing is confiscated, he’s issued a tear-resistant gown, better known as a “Bam-Bam” suit. It looks kinda like a big, thick, loose, Velcro-attached dress that barely covers him. He’s allowed no other articles of clothing, not even underwear, though upon entering his solitary confinement cell, he’ll be issued one small, tear-resistant blanket and a narrow, tear-resistant foam mattress. This holds true for all suicidal prisoners; even the transgender ones with breasts are forced to wear the same loose-fitting Bam-Bam suit.
After the shower stall, with nothing but thin paper slippers covering his feet, the suicidal prisoner will be escorted to a solitary confinement cell. In Michigan we call this a “Bam-Bam cell,” and it’s located in ad seg., better known as “the Hole.” The pain-wracked, emotionally distraught prisoner isn’t treated kindly at this point, like any decent human would expect. No, his sickness has somehow ruined the entire day for the Hole guards by making them have to work.
The suicidal prisoner will be manhandled the entire walk to his Bam-Bam cell, and along the way, those “overworked” guards will berate him in a million different ways. Some will accuse him of faking because “if he really wanted to kill himself, he would have just done it.” Others will call him a “coward for wanting to take the easy way out.” Still others will pressure him to tell the psychologist he was originally lying, or that he now feels better and wants to be taken off suicide watch. That way, the suicidal prisoner won’t be on suicide watch for more than a day or so.
When a man is placed on suicide watch, the guards are forced to walk to his Bam-Bam cell every 15 minutes on the dot, look over the POA’s shoulder into the cell’s interior to check on the suicidal prisoner, then click a button on the wall that records they did a round. This is called “doing 15-minute rounds,” and all of the guards—and I mean all of them—grow angry about having to do these rounds. It’s all I hear about while I sit over there in the Hole doing shift after shift of suicide watches.
Never mind that the person I’m watching is mentally ill, or off his meds and on the verge of killing himself, or has just suffered the catastrophic loss of his mom or dad or wife or child or some other loved one having passed away. No, the guards working the Hole only care about themselves. They care that they have to stop watching YouTube in their cushy, air-conditioned office and walk over to click the damn button. Sad, but true.
Life Inside a Bam-Bam Cell
Once the suicidal prisoner is housed inside the Bam-Bam cell, he’s forced to deal with pissed-off guards. Which means every little thing they’re supposed to do for him becomes a tool of reprisal. They do whatever they can to make his life a living hell. Too cold in the cell? Too bad. Too hot and the window won’t open? Too bad. Toilet’s broken? Too bad. No running water? Too. Damn. Bad!
At this point, it takes a sergeant or higher for the suicidal prisoner to get anything accomplished. He might be held in this Bam-Bam cell for weeks. He’s fed so-called finger-food with no utensils. Imagine trying to eat spaghetti or baked beans with no spork (sporks are the only type of utensil allowed in Michigan prisons). I’ve seen it, and it’s not pretty.
The suicidal prisoner is also not allowed to shower while on suicide watch. I’ve seen men go many weeks without a shower or even access to a bar of soap. The stench that rolls out of an observation cell’s open food slot during chow time often makes me gag. Can you imagine not being able to wash your body in any way for weeks? This is totally inhumane, yet the system does it to “help” these mentally ill people. Disgusting.
What Prisoners Say About Suicide Watch
Over the last 18 months, I’ve asked many of the prisoners I’ve watched the same three questions. Some of them refused to answer, or answered only one or two of the questions, but most of these suffering souls answered all of the questions once I explained to them that I’m a prisoner journalist working on a project about the use of Bam-Bam cells in prison.
The first question I asked was simple: Do you think that being housed in a Bam-Bam cell helps in any way?
Of the 110 answers I received, 60 answered yes, and 50 answered no. With a little follow-up, I learned that the prisoners who said yes mostly said yes because they felt they needed to be alone, away from the general prison population. Otherwise, the Bam-Bam cell sucked. Of those who answered no, they were mostly those who were forced into the Bam-Bam cell and didn’t wish to be there at all.
The second question I asked: Do you feel being in the Bam-Bam gown helps in any way?
Of the 112 prisoners who answered, 108 answered no, and the general feeling among them was that the Bam-Bam gown degraded them and made them feel embarrassed or ashamed whenever a female (male for trans prisoners) employee would see them dressed in such a manner. Of the four who answered yes, they felt that the Bam-Bam gowns were a necessity to keep them from hurting themselves, though they too disliked the negative feelings the gown elicited when opposite-gender employees came around.
The final question I asked was: Overall, do you find being locked in solitary confinement while on suicide watch a good thing or a bad thing?
This was a difficult question for many of the suicidal prisoners to answer, because, on the one hand, most of them knew they needed help, but on the other, the general feeling was that there had to be a better, less-degrading way to go about offering up that help.
The Long-Term Cost of Suicide Watch in Prison
Locking a mentally distraught prisoner away from other humans, especially their own family and loved ones doesn’t help that prisoner in the long run. (I forgot to mention that once a suicidal prisoner is placed on suicide watch, all contact with the free world is severed. No in-person visits. No video visits. No phone calls. No emails. No mail. Nothing.)
In the short run, locking a suicidal prisoner away in solitary confinement as a cheap, quick fix stops him from killing himself and shields the FBOP and the MDOC from liability, but the long-term emotional and mental damage being done to these men far outweighs the extra effort and cost needed for a more humane way of treatment.
Admitting them to a hospital’s psych ward would be costly up front, but it would save thousands (and possibly millions) on the back end when these folks are paroled out with a healthy, clean bill of mental health instead of the many types of mental disorders proven to be brought on by solitary confinement.
My name is #JerryMetcalf, and I wish to make the world a better place. If you do too, please join me on social media.
