Impact of The HALT Act on Solitary Confinement in New York State
7.3.2025
On Feb. 17, New York State corrections officers went on an unauthorized strike and demanded safer working conditions. One of their complaints was that the rules around solitary confinement, which went into effect in 2022, created dangerous conditions and prevented them from being able to adequately do their jobs.
This article will examine the passage of the HALT Act, its implementation, and the correction officers’ claims that it has made their jobs more difficult.
As of May 1, 503 prisoners were being held in segregated confinement in New York State prisons out of an estimated average of 18,403 inmates.[1] The Department of Corrections and Community Supervision also reported 1,974 incarcerated individuals housed in residential rehabilitation units.
Solitary confinement has been used in the United States since 1787. It has been controversial at least as far back as the early 1800s, when the regular use of the disciplinary tactic in a Philadelphia prison was brought under scrutiny because inmates were committing suicide and suffering acute mental trauma.[2] In 1890, in a U.S. Supreme Court case in which James Medley, a man awaiting the death penalty for murdering his wife, went to court after being held in solitary confinement for 45 days prior to his execution. Medley claimed that solitary confinement was cruel and unusual punishment. According to the court, “a considerable number of the prisoners fell, after even a short confinement, into a semi-fatuous condition, from which it was next to impossible to arouse them, and others became violently insane; others still, committed suicide; while those who stood the ordeal better were not generally reformed, and in most cases did not recover sufficient mental activity to be of any subsequent service to the community.” [3]
Yet, less than 100 years later, solitary confinement had become an increasingly popular strategy in U.S. prisons. In the 1980s, corrections officials began to lock down entire prisons, with inmates kept in their cells 23 hours a day with no access to educational programming or work assignments. The first prison built for this purpose, called a “SuperMax,” was erected in 1989 in California. By 2005, 40 states were housing 25,000 inmates in these facilities.[4]
Historically, New York prisons have used segregation and solitary housing units as a routine form of disciplinary intervention for misconduct by incarcerated individuals. Prior to the enactment of the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act in 2022, individuals incarcerated in New York state facilities who were accused of violating the inmate rules and regulations could be subject to segregated confinement in cells for up to 23 hours a day over any number of consecutive days, months, or years. Individuals were allowed to leave their cells only to shower or for one hour of recreation. They were kept completely separate from the general prison population at all times.[5]
NYSBA Report on Solitary Confinement
In 2013, the New York State Bar Association’s House of Delegates approved a report by the Committee on Civil Rights on solitary confinement. It recommended changes to the use of solitary confinement in New York State, calling for “clear and objective standards to ensure that prisoners are separated from the general population only in a very limited and very legitimate circumstances and only for the briefest period and under the least restrictive conditions practicable.”[6] It also called upon the state Legislature to hold hearings on the issue. In 2019, NYSBA also issued a memorandum in support of legislation restricting the use of solitary confinement.
In 2021, the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act was introduced to the New York State Legislature by state Senator Julia Salazar and Assemblymember Jeffrion Aubrey. Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the HALT Act into law on March 31, 2021. It restricts the use of solitary confinement in prisons and jails, mandates alternative rehabilitative measures, and limits the duration of segregated confinement.
The HALT Act was inspired in part by the United Nations “Nelson Mandela rules.” Those rules set forth the standard for modern prison administration and followed the basic primary principle:
“All prisoners shall be treated with the respect due to their inherent dignity and value as human beings. No prisoner shall be subjected to, and all prisoners shall be protected from torture and other cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment or punishment, for which no circumstances whatsoever may be invoked as a justification. The safety and security of prisoners, staff, service providers, and visitors shall be insured at all times.”[7]
It also referenced the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, which concluded that “solitary confinement of more than fifteen consecutive days can amount to torture.”[8]
Key Provisions of the HALT Act
The HALT Act amended New York Corrections Law by defining “segregated confinement” to mean confinement of an inmate in any form of cell confinement for more than 17 hours a day other than in a facility-wide emergency or for the purpose of providing medical or mental health treatment.[9]
The bill also defines “residential rehabilitative units” as separate housing units used for therapy, treatment, and rehabilitative programming of incarcerated people who have been determined to require more than 15 days of segregated confinement pursuant to department proceedings. Moreover, the units are designated as “therapeutic and trauma-informed and aim to address individual treatment and rehabilitation needs and underlying causes of problematic behaviors.”[10]
The act ensures that during mental health assessments, an individual found to have a serious mental illness may not be placed in segregated confinement or a residential rehabilitative unit, except for keeplock periods prior to disciplinary hearings. Even when placed in keeplock awaiting a hearing, they must be given seven hours per day out-of-cell time or be transferred to a residential rehabilitative unit or a mental health treatment unit no longer than 48 hours after being kept locked up.
Correction Law Section 137(6) further limits the use of segregated confinement when it comes to special population individuals, which includes those 21 years or younger, 55 years or older, individuals with disabilities, pregnant individuals or those within the first eight weeks of postpartum recovery, and mothers caring for newborns in prison. While in a residential rehabilitative unit, an incarcerated person must have access to programs and work assignments comparable to core programs and work assignments in the general population. They also must have access to additional out-of-cell, trauma-informed therapeutic programming and help preparing for discharge from the unit and to the community.
To use solitary confinement beyond the limits of the HALT Act, first there must be an evidentiary hearing. Second, the hearing officer must prepare a written decision. Third, the decision must conclude that there is an unreasonable risk to the security of the facility. A period of incarceration can be extended by finding that the violation caused or attempted to cause serious physical injury or death to another person or making an imminent threat or such physical injury or death, or if the person has a history of causing such physical injury or death and there is a strong likelihood that the person will carry out such a threat. Such determinations must also involve the commissioner of mental health or a designee.
Where that individual is found to possess a significant and unreasonable risk to the safety and security of others, then the department can restrict participation in programming and out-of-cell activities, as necessary. The department must then provide at least four hours of out-of-cell time daily, which includes at least two hours of therapeutic programming and two hours of recreation. If an incarcerated individual poses an imminent threat, engages in sexual violence, commits acts of extortion, incites or attempts to cause a riot, obtains deathly or dangerous weapons or contraband, or attempts to escape from the facility, correctional staff may place that person in segregated confinement beyond the limits of the HALT Act.[11]
Continued placement in residential units is reviewed on a regular basis, and individuals who have not been discharged within one year of their initial admission have a right to be discharged from the unit unless they have committed one of the serious acts listed within the prior 180 days and possess a significant and unreasonable risk to the safety or security of incarcerated persons or staff. The statute provides for immediate and automatic independent review by the commissioner and the commissioner of mental health or their designees for such continued segregation. The HALT Act requires a meaningful periodic review of the status of each incarcerated person in a residential rehabilitative unit at least every 60 days to assess the individual’s progress and to determine if the person should be discharged from the unit.
The HALT Act provides that employees assigned to the solitary housing units and residential rehabilitative units undergo a minimum of 37 hours and 30 minutes of training prior to any assignments. The training includes the purpose and goals of the non-punitive therapeutic environment, the basics of restorative justice, and dispute resolution methods. Justice centers are also required to review the department’s compliance with the provisions of Correction Law Sections 137-2 and 138.
Inspector General’s Report
The HALT Act has succeeded in its primary aim in reducing the use of and the length of time inmates serve in solitary confinement in order to safeguard health and promote rehabilitation.[12] However, there is still work to be done in order to fully comply with the act.
On Aug. 5, 2024, the Office of the Inspector General released its report reviewing the HALT Act and compliance by the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision. The report acknowledged that, following HALT’s enactment, numerous complaints were made regarding the implementation of the law and that the department was failing to issue required written justifications for the use of confinement exceeding the mandatory limits. There were also incidents when restraints were used improperly.
The inspector general found that antiquated recordkeeping systems posed significant impediments to accurately monitoring and reporting on critical metrics such as the use and duration of segregated confinement. She noted that there were inconsistencies and incomplete records from some facilities and recommended that recordkeeping systems be modernized to improve transparency and reporting accuracy. The report also criticized the agency for not investing in technology but noted that Commissioner Daniel F. Martuscello III was making improvements. Significantly, the report also found that the department lacked HALT-mandated justification for holding some people in segregated confinement. As noted above, the prisons are required to document in writing the justification for a determination exceeding HALT requirements and segregation. The inspector general found that many of these decisions lacked sufficient written justification for such confinement.[13]
On the positive front, the report found that in June of 2023, the commissioner acted to aid staff in complying with HALT by creating new forms called Confinement Justification Forms. Following the use of these forms, however, the inspector general still found that in their review of 100 incidents, 1 in 5 lacked sufficient written justification for extended segregation.[14]
The Corrections Officers Strike
The series of events that led up to the wildcat strike by corrections officers started in December 2024, when an inmate, Robert Brooks, died following a fatal beating by corrections officers at Marcy Correctional Facility. Following his death, Gov. Kathy Hochul ordered the firing of 13 officers and one nurse involved in the incident. A grand jury in Onondaga County subsequently indicted nine defendants for the murder of Brooks. Six officers were charged with second-degree murder and first-degree manslaughter. One officer has since pled guilty to manslaughter in a plea deal.[15]
Robert Brooks certainly was not the first incarcerated individual who died at a correctional facility. In the Brooks case, however, his death was captured unknowingly by body cameras worn by some of the corrections officers. The brutal beating captured on video could not be ignored, and it outraged not only the governor and the commissioner of the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, but also brought public scrutiny on corrections officers and the culture that would permit such brutality.
As the horrific story of the death of Robert Brooks made headlines throughout New York State, corrections officers left their jobs and set up picket lines in an unsanctioned strike. The Taylor Law prohibits New York State public employees from striking. For certain unions, primarily involving law enforcement, the law provides for binding arbitration and imposes penalties against the union for violation of the law. The New York State Corrections Officers and Police Benevolent Association did not authorize the strike and therefore was not subject to penalties of the Taylor Law. The union did, however, engage in bargaining sessions with the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision during this time.
The strikers complained of severe staff shortages, dangerous working conditions, forced overtime, and the limitations posed by the HALT Act, which they argued made their jobs more difficult.
In February, state Senators Dan Stec and James Tedisco proposed an amendment to repeal the HALT Act, arguing that the act made for dangerous conditions for corrections officers. Senator Tedisco cited an 85% increase in assaults on corrections officers between 2019 and 2024.[16] The proposed amendment was voted down.[17]
On Feb. 21, CNY Central reported that “while corrections officers at the protest outside Cayuga Correctional denied any link, an advocate with the Center for Community Alternatives said that there is no coincidence that these strikes are taking place the week that indictments were unsealed in Robert Brooks’ death.” That same report noted that the Department of Correctional and Community Services would be suspending “elements” of the HALT Act until prisons could be operated safely again.[18]
The Kingston Daily Freeman also reported that New York officials had declared a prison-wide state of emergency and temporarily suspended parts of the HALT Act. Officials said “provisions of the HALT Legislation permit temporary suspension of specific elements of HALT under ‘exceptional circumstances’ . . . where these circumstances create a significant and unreasonable risk to the safety and security of other incarcerated persons, staff or the facility.”[19]
A retired corrections officer said in response to the memorandum, “[t]hey know that they’ve been lied to before [and] they’ll be lied to again,” and that there are “[t]oo many stipulations because the HALT Act is suspended temporarily. That means that 12:01, when people come back to work, it’s back in action and [our issues get] washed off the table like nothing even happened.”[20]
Advocates with the HALT Solitary Campaign, a project of the New York Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement, argued:
“People will die – by suicide, by overdose, and in the hands of emboldened guards who know they can get away with anything simply by disappearing their abuse victims in solitary confinement. Moreover, this action will make prisons less safe, because solitary confinement only worsens behavioral challenges.”[21]
On Feb. 28, various media sources reported that a mediator had released a consent award agreed on by state and union leaders in which certain elements of the HALT Act would continue to be suspended for at least another 90 days.
The consent award used language in the agreement to continue suspending “programming elements” of the HALT Act for another 90 days “owing to the ongoing emergency” and existing staff shortages. The agreement further noted that following 30 days, the department would commence an evaluation of the operations, safety, and security at prisons to determine whether it would be safe to reinstate the suspended provisions based on staffing levels.
Senator Salazar said that she is “disappointed and concerned with certain elements of the consent agreement, particularly because the language around the HALT Act creates the fear that New York would take a step backward regarding the harmful use of long-term segregated confinement.” The senator also cited the 2024 inspector general’s report, which stated that the department had not even implemented the HALT Act properly, and further, “[w]hile the lack of full compliance with the HALT Law was unacceptable even before corrections officers unauthorized work stoppage, the newly announced consent agreement exacerbates concerns about HALT implementation.”[22]
Commissioner Martuscello announced the end of the strike on March 10. The department announced that the commissioner would “exercise his statutory discretion under the HALT Act and continue the temporary suspension of only the programming elements of the HALT Act for ninety days,” starting March 8.[23]
The Future of the HALT Act
The HALT Act is the law in New York state. Corrections officers clearly believe that the limits on the use of solitary confinement have made their jobs more difficult and created safety issues for themselves and other incarcerated individuals. Advocates for the law maintain that, as noted in the inspector general’s report of August 2024, that the procedures contained in the HALT Act that provide for longer periods of segregation are not well understood by frontline corrections officers. Moreover, as reported in the inspector general’s report, compliance with procedures for implementing longer terms of segregation are not being followed.
Corrections officers have a difficult and sometimes dangerous job. Staffing problems at New York’s correctional institutions require extraordinary recruiting and retention incentives. The implementation of the HALT Act has been severely curtailed by the state’s failure to provide prison officials with the necessary technology and training to implement it.
Rather than debating the HALT Act’s outcomes, it is important to continue to advocate for the reduced use of solitary confinement while providing more thorough training and education for those who are responsible for administering it.
Norman P. Effman has been with the Wyoming County Public Defender’s Office since 1990. He is the executive director of the Wyoming County-Attica Legal Aid Bureau and has practiced criminal law in both the private and public sector for 55 years. He is on NYSBA’s Executive Committee and is the elected president of the 8th Judicial Section and is a member of the Executive Committee of the Criminal Justice Section. He is a past recipient of NYSBA’s Criminal Justice Section Award for Outstanding Contribution to Defense Service and the section’s Award for Outstanding Contribution to Correctional Service.
Leah Rene Nowotarski is the public defender of Wyoming County and a staff attorney at Attica Legal Aid. She specializes in representing clients in post-conviction matters. She has served as chair of the Criminal Justice Section and the Committee on Mandated Representation, as a member of CJS’s Executive Committee and various subcommittees, member-at-large to the Executive Committee, member of the House of Delegates, and fellow of the New York Bar Foundation.
Endnotes:
[1] New York State Dept. of Corr. & Community Supervision, Table 1A: Demographics of Individuals Housed in Segregated Confinement 2024-2025, https://doccs.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2025/04/halt-annual-report-2024-2025.pdf; Div. Crim. Just. Services, Jail Population in New York State, May 1, 2025, https://www.criminaljustice.ny.gov/crimnet/ojsa/jail_population.pdf.
[2] Laura Sullivan, Timeline: Solitary Confinement in U.S. Prisons, Special Series: Life in Solitary Confinement, National Public Radio. July 6, 2006, https://www.npr.org/2006/07/26/5579901/timeline-solitary-confinement-in-u-s-prisons.
[3] Quoted in Sullivan, supra note 2.
[4] Sullivan, supra note 2.
[5] See 7 N.Y.C.R.R. § 250 prior to HALT Amendment filed with the Dep’t of State on April 19, 2023.
[6] NYSBA Committee on Civil Rights, Report: Solitary Confinement in New York State, N.Y. State Bar Ass’n, Jan. 25, 2013, https://nysba.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/SolitaryConfinementReport_0413.pdf.
[7] Quoted in Lucy Lang, Review of the First Two Years of HALT at the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, State of N.Y. Offices of the Inspector General, Aug. 2024, at 16, https://ig.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2024/08/nys-oig-doccs-halt-report-8.5.24.pdf.
[8] Genevieve Bombard, Explaining the New York State Prison Strike and the HALT Act, Albany Law School, Mar. 6, 2025, https://www.albanylaw.edu/government-law-center/explaining-the-halt-act.
[9] Corr. Law § 2(23-1).
[10] Residential Rehabilitation Unit Program Manual, N.Y. State Dep’t of Corrections and Community Supervision, Nov. 2023, at 1, https://doccs.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2024/01/rrupm.pdf.
[11] See Corr. Law § 137(6)(k)(i)(11)(A-G)).
[12] Assessing the Early Months of Implementation of the HALT Solitary Confinement Law in New York State Prisons, Correctional Ass’n of N.Y. State, Mar. 2023, at 2, https://static1.squarespace.com/static/62f1552c1dd65741c53bbcf8/t/641a1aa0c4f82202db41fcf0/1679432372691/2023_ImplementationofHALT.pdf.
[13] Lang, supra note 7.
[14] Id. at 17.
[15] Liam Stack and Jane Gottlieb, Officer Pleads Guilty in Fatal Beating of Prisoner Seen on Camera, N.Y. Times, May 5, 2025, https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/05/nyregion/christopher-walrath-guilty-robert-brooks.html.
[16] James Tedisco, Halt the HALT Act, N.Y. State Senate, Mar. 3, 2025, https://www.nysenate.gov/newsroom/articles/2025/james-tedisco/halt-halt-act.
[17] Senator Stec’s Attempt To Repeal HALT Act Denied, WCAX News, Feb. 25, 2025, https://www.wwnytv.com/2025/02/25/senator-stecs-attempt-repeal-halt-act-denied.
[18] Conor Wight, Corrections Officers Want HALT Act Repealed as Strikes Continue, CNYCentral, Feb. 21, 2025, https://cnycentral.com/news/local/corrections-officers-want-halt-act-repealed-as-strikes-continue.
[19] Diane Pineiro-Zucker, NY Temporarily Suspends Parts of HALT Act, OKs Extra Overtime in Response to Corrections Officers Strike, Daily Freeman, Feb. 20, 2025, https://www.dailyfreeman.com/2025/02/20/ny-temporarily-suspends-parts-of-halt-act-oks-extra-overtime-in-response-to-corrections-officers-strike.
[20] Brian Dwyer et al., DOCCS Temporarily Suspends Parts of HALT Act Amid Correction Officer Strikes, Spectrum News, Feb. 20, 2025, https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nys/watertown/public-safety/2025/02/20/riverview-correctional-facility-large-police-response.
[21] Press Release: HALT Solitary Campaign Condemns Governor Hochul’s Illegal Move To Suspend HALT Law, Release Aging People in Prison, Feb. 20, 2025, https://rappcampaign.com/halt-solitary-campaign-condemns-governor-hochuls-illegal-move-to-suspend-halt-law.
[22] Sen. Julia Salazar, Senator Julia Salazar’s Statement on Consent Agreement Between DOCCS and NYSCOPBA, Feb. 8, 2025, https://x.com/SalazarSenate/status/1895577065455567273.
[23] Dep’t of Corrections and Community Supervision, Memorandum of Agreement Between the State of New York and the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association, Inc. (NYSCOPBA), Mar. 8, 2025, https://doccs.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2025/04/moa-doccs-nyscopba-3.8.2025.pdf.
