Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law

harshness of the conditions, exclusionary orders that

exempted certain categories of prisoners from such

confinement, but a concession that there was no legal

basis to order that the supermax prisons be closed.

The legal threshold for finding conditions of confine-

ment unconstitutional has been set especially high in the

United States over the past several decades. Supermax

prisons per se continue to come very close to this thresh-

old and, in the case of mentally ill prisoners, were found

to have crossed it. As the empirical record about the psy-

chological effects of this kind of confinement continues

to be augmented, and the consequences of long-term

confinement in these units becomes clearer, other courts

may reach different and perhaps even more sweeping

conclusions about the legality of supermax.

Craig Haney

See alsoPrison Overcrowding

Further Readings

Haney, C. (2003). Mental health issues in long-term solitary

and “supermax” confinement. Crime & Delinquency,

49,124–156.

Haney, C., & Lynch, M. (1997). Regulating prisons

of the future: The psychological consequences

of solitary and supermax confinement. New York

University Review of Law and Social Change,

23,477–570.

King, R. (2000). The rise and rise of supermax: An American

solution in search of a problem? Punishment and Society,

1,163–186.

Kurki, L., & Morris, N. (2001). The purposes, practices, and

problems of supermax prisons. Crime and Justice, 28,

385–424.

Madrid v. Gomez,889 F. Supp. 1146 (1995).

Riveland, C. (1999). Supermax prisons: Overview and

general considerations. Washington, DC: U.S.

Department of Justice.

790 ———Supermax Prisons

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