South Carolina inmates given solitary confinement for using social media

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South Carolina inmates will continue to be given solitary confinement for accessing Facebook and other social networking sites, but the number of days they serve there will be reduced, South Carolina Department of Corrections Deputy Communications Director Stephanie Givens told Sputnik.

"Prisoners will now receive 60 days of solitary confinement for accessing social networking sites through contraband," Givens said on Monday.

Givens confirmed reports of harsher solitary confinement punishments, but said the lengthier sentences were because of "stacking of charges," where the accessing of social networking sites is compounded with other charges.

After the department was sued by mental health institutions, Givens said, the department changed course, and sanctions of inmates are no longer stacked.

That policy, however, has not changed for inmates who pose a threat to the safety of everyone in prison", Givens said, and their sentence in solitary confinement can be indeterminate. Inmates who exhibit good behaviour may win back their basic privileges when they are not placed in solitary confinement, she added.

The digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) reported earlier in February that hundreds of inmates were sentenced to years of solitary confinement for accessing Facebook and other social networking sites.

The South Carolina Department of Corrections was reformed in 1960 after authorities discovered abuses in the correctional system, and now reports directly to South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley.