According to a 2015 study by experts at New York University’s medical school, suicide was one of the top causes of death in ICE detention between 2003 and 2015. The study cites criticism of ICE for putting “patients with mental illness into detention instead of allowing them to receive community-based treatment.”

Yet there is at least one less policy limit on detaining people with mental illness now than when that study came out. A month after President Trump’s inauguration, the Department of Homeland Security rescinded a 2014 memo that stated ICE should not detain people “suffering from serious physical or mental illness” unless there were “extraordinary circumstances or the requirement of mandatory detention.”

Opponents of solitary confinement have questioned whether its use for long periods of time violates the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. In one case, a federal judge wrote that placing those with mental illness in solitary confinement is akin to “putting an asthmatic in a place with little air to breathe.” The discussion of solitary has predominantly been in the context of prison—a punishment for those found guilty of a crime. Because immigrant detention, unlike prison, is not officially meant to be punitive, prolonged use of solitary may pose additional legal and constitutional concerns.

The ICE data obtained by POGO shows some detainees were kept in solitary for long periods, in nine cases exceeding a year, such as:

A woman at the ICE detention center in Adelanto, California, who was “diagnosed with Other Specified Trauma and Stressor-related D/O [disorder],” was released from solitary in December 2017 after 454 days;

Another woman at Adelanto, who was “diagnosed with PTSD/ Major Depressive D/O (Severe),” was released in August 2017 after 372 days;

A man at Yuba County Jail in California, who was “diagnosed with psychotic disorder,” was released in April 2018 after 413 days; and

A man detained at the ICE Service Processing Center in Buffalo, New York, was released from solitary in May 2018 after 790 days—more than two years. According to the ICE data, he did not have mental illness.

“Years on end of near-total isolation exact a terrible price,” wrote then-Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy in a 2015 concurring opinion. He cited research showing that “common side-effects of solitary confinement include anxiety, panic, withdrawal, hallucinations, self-mutilation, and suicidal thoughts and behaviors.”

An independent expert on human rights appointed by the United Nations recommended all countries ban the use of “prolonged solitary confinement,” solitary beyond 15 days. “At that point … some of the harmful psychological effects of isolation can become irreversible,” U.N. special rapporteur Juan E. Méndez wrote in a 2011 report.

In recent years, some state prison systems have curbed their use of solitary: Texas has banned solitary as a punishment for breaking rules and Colorado has banned use of solitary exceeding 15 days.

In May, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists quoted an ICE spokesperson who said solitary “protects detainees, staff, contractors, and volunteers from harm.” Yet state prisons that have reduced use of solitary say it can be done without increasing risk. Officials from five states told the Government Accountability Office in 2013 that moving inmates out of restrictive housing, such as solitary, led to “no increase in violence” and officials from two states said millions of dollars were saved by reducing the number of people held in solitary.

ICE also isn’t the only federal agency under scrutiny for its use of solitary for people with mental illness. In 2017, the Justice Department’s Inspector General wrote that the Bureau of Prisons had “inmates, including those with mental illness, who were housed in single-cell confinement for long periods of time, isolated from other inmates and with limited human contact.” (The watchdog also wrote that the Bureau “states that it does not practice solitary confinement, or even recognize the term.”)

However, in contrast with ICE, as Senators Grassley and Blumenthal wrote in their recent letter, Bureau prisons are in some ways better equipped to deal with the challenges faced by detained populations “who require special attention,” such as those with mental illness. Many ICE detention facilities effectively have two options for holding detainees: keeping them in the general population or isolating them in segregation.

In 2009, an ICE official made a similar observation: “segregation cells are often used to detain special populations whose unique medical, mental health, and protective custody requirements cannot be accommodated in general population housing.” The official further wrote that segregation is “not conducive to recovery.”

Little seems to have changed in the ensuing decade. Andrew Lorenzen-Strait, a former senior ICE official who left the agency in May, told Politico that ICE studied how prisons cared for the mentally ill to devise a 30-bed pilot program at its Krome detention center in Florida. He estimated 3,000 to 6,000 ICE detainees have mental illness.

The reliance on solitary for holding detainees with special vulnerabilities like mental illness reflects a “basic structural challenge for ICE,” Senators Grassley and Blumenthal wrote to the acting head of the agency last month.

Some critics say the most fundamental problem is the detention of people with mental illness. “At the end of the day, the best way to get their treatment is not to be detained,” Hannah Cartwright, supervising attorney at the National Immigrant Justice Center, told Politico.

What is clear is use of solitary in ICE detention is on the rise and more needs to be done to oversee how it is used and to stop its misuse and overuse.

