ban the use of solitary confinement for prisoners who are seriously mentally ill.

We, at David's Hope, believe that prisoners who suffer from serious mental illness should not be subject to solitary confinement. There is plenty of research and evidence proving that this is a cruel and unusual punishment. Yet it is a common practice in America's prisons. According to Jeffery L. Metzner, MD, solitary confinement can cause anxiety, depression, anger, cognitive disturbances, perceptual distortions, obsessive thoughts, paranoia, and psychosis for a person who isn't mentally ill. These are symptoms a person with mental illness may be experiencing. It's often these symptoms that precipitate the behavior that results in solitary confinement which has the result of making the symptoms worse, often making it impossible for the person to recover. Please ban this practice.