One Inmates Account Of Solitary Confinement In Prison
By: Jessica Kent
Tags: Prison Industrial Complex, Solitary Confinement, Prison, Addiction, Prison Reform

Jessica Kent Mug Shot 2011

For years I struggled with substance abuse disorder. Despite having access to any and all information regarding any topic one might be interested in, substance abuse disorder is still misunderstood by so many.

My substance abuse disorder was caused by environmental factors, a genetic predisposition and severe depression. Growing up in section eight housing was just the first obstacle life would throw my way. Poverty is never easy. Some days I didn't have enough to eat, others we were being evicted.

At the age of 12, I was offered my first sip of alcohol. That was the day my addiction began. For the first time I was happy, felt confident and was no longer socially awkward. However, that one sip set in motion a decade long addiction. My brain does not make enough dopamine to be happy. Having no knowledge of mental health or depression at the time, I believed alcohol was the key to my happiness. It was my medicine.

Over time, my addiction to alcohol progressed to pills, then from pills to heroin. Before long I found myself in jail.

As described in my self titled Youtube channel, I have been arrested many times due to my substance abuse disorder.

I was placed in solitary confinement many times. However, one time stands out above all the rest.

I was sentenced to five years in the state of Arkansas. This experience would change my perspective on prison and open my eyes to the inhumane living conditions, abuse and the cruel treatment of inmates.

After being involved in a physical altercation with another inmate, one who was convicted of sex crimes against her own child, I was pepper sprayed and dragged to solitary confinement. I would like to take a moment to pause the story to describe how severe this was. The correctional officers did not announce to myself and the other inmate that we needed to break up the fight. One tried to grab me from behind without saying anything. The confusion of that moment is what led to them reaching for pepper spray. In survival mode at the time, I immediately thought another inmate was trying to fight me, from behind.

Each prison has a protocol that should be followed leading up to pepper spraying an inmate as well as after peppering an inmate. They should have taken me to an area to allow me and assist me with rinsing the spray off. This was not done. I was left in a dark cell with my eyes so swollen I could barley see. Due to the confusion of the fight, mid fight, I turned around to see an officer standing there. At that exact moment, is when she sprayed the pepper spray and as a result, I took a direct hit of it to my eyes.

Crawling on the floor of the cell, I managed to get to the sink to rinse the spray out of my eyes. I would spend the next 3hours or so crying in pain.

During the three months I spent in solitary confinement, I saw many things that will haunt me for the rest of my life. I saw a trans women being held in solitary for simply being trans. She was kept there for years. I saw a woman take her own life. I saw correctional officers refuse medical treatment to a woman who had some kind of severe stomach bug. I saw the bottom tier flood with sewer water, and those inmates were kept in their cells for hours before anyone came in to clean the feces off the floor. They sat in 3 inches of sewer water for hours. I was left standing in a tiny cage they used as a shower for 6 hours because the officer did not like me telling him that I was done with my shower. I saw a woman try to take her life, only to be stripped naked, placed into a Velcro suit and told to shut up as her cries of desperation were bothering the officers.

The idea that we can treat human beings this way simply because they made a mistake is incomprehensible. Make no mistake, I knew full well that my substance abuse disorder was illegal. I also knew that selling those substances to pay for said addiction, was illegal. However, we need to begin treating addiction like the health crisis it is and stop punishing those who are struggling.

During my last prison stay, I saw drugs on a daily basis. Through the added trauma of that prison stay, I fought to stay sober. To say that it was difficult, is such a gross understatement.

Today, despite many challenges, triggers and obstacles along the way, I have 9 years sober. I have dedicated my life to helping those in and out of prison and anyone I can who suffers from substance abuse disorder.

If we want to see lasting, meaningful change, we have to have the courage to decriminalize drugs and law makers need to understand that addiction is complex disease of the mind and body and begin to work together to provide resources for those in active addiction. We do so with harm reduction, treatment options and understanding. Together is the only way we will end the stigma surrounding addiction.