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Compassionate Release from New York State Prisons: Why are So Few Getting Out?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2021

Extract

It is inevitable that some inmates in large state prison systems will suffer from terminal conditions and die while incarcerated. But how those inmates experience that event is primarily controlled by correctional policies and by the prison medical and correctional staff assigned to their care. Compassion for inmates who are dying cannot be legislated or mandated, but humane and compassionate care for the dying can be facilitated or thwarted by legislative and correctional policies, and by the manner in which correctional personnel interpret those policies.

Death in New York State prisons is a frequent event, occurring at a rate substantially higher than that in most other states. With a prison population that has risen to 70,000 inmates and with the nation’s highest rate of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, more than 2,817 inmates died in New York prisons during the period 1990-1998. In April 1992, in the face of an ever-increasing death rate in its prisons, the New York State legislature passed the Medical Parole Law, a measure designed to permit dying inmates to be released on parole prior to their normal release eligibility date.

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Article
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics 1999

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References

New York's death rate per 1,000 for the 3-year period from 1994 to 1996 was 5.6 inmate deaths as compared with a national rate of 3.1 inmate deaths, a rate 80 percent higher than the national average. See Hammett, T. Harmon, P., and Maruschak, L., 1996–1997 Update: HIV/AIDS, STDs, and TB in Correctional Facilities (Washington, D.C.: National Institute of Justice, NCJ 176344, July 1999): at 11 tbl. 5.Google Scholar
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