Jail Uses Restraint Chair For Suicidal Inmates

Charged with being drunk in public, a young woman was recently kept in a restraint chair for hours in the holding unit of our local jail. This was because she was in a highly confused and suicidal state after having been sexually assaulted while allegedly under the influence of a date rape drug.

In spite of her repeated pleas to be able to go to the bathroom and to have the straps on her arms and legs adjusted due to her severe discomfort, the officers present kept her in the chair, following jail protocol.

This led me to submit another FOIA request to Sheriff Hutcheson regarding the frequency of the use of the restraint chair. As always, the sheriff's response, via one of his officers, was professional and timely, a summary of which follows:

Use of Restraint Chair, January 1 to June 30, 2020

The restraint chair was used a total of 57 times. Thirty-one of these were for individuals who were highly combative (often under the influence of a mind-altering drug) and who were danger to others. The other twenty-six times were for "medical reasons," cases where people were deemed be in danger to themselves, as in the incident above.

The total number of hours the restraint chair was used during this six-month period was 231.5 hours, with 4.06 hours being the average length of use. The longest time was 8 hours and the shortest a mere ten minutes.

I have great respect for the sheriff, and have had numerous conversations with him about these and other concerns. My appeal has been that the jail, through its contract with our local Community Services Board, provide a trained person to be a calming and therapeutic presence fo an inmate who is in a delusional or highly depressed state. I've also suggested that a group of local mental health counselors be on call on a volunteer basis for such situations.

In a community of caring people and one that is rich in available resources, we should be able to come up with humane ways of responding to people in severe emotional distress.