Offender sues over solitary punishment

A young offender is suing for £10,000 damages after he was
placed in solitary confinement at Polmont Young Offenders
Institution near Falkirk.

Norman Carlton has applied for judicial review at the Court of
Session over a governor’s decision to take him out of the
institution’s mainstream population. The 18-year-old, who was
sentenced to eight years in 2001 for culpable homicide, was taken
from the hall where he was housed and placed in another unit on a
punishment rule.

Carlton claims this punishment was after an attack on a prisoner by
another inmate. He claims his “human dignity” suffered after he was
locked in a cell for 23 hours a day with no contact with fellow
inmates.

The case was called before Lord McEwan last month and is expected
to return to court at a later date.

Meanwhile, the number of knives going into Polmont is increasing,
according to an annual report by the institution’s visiting
committee, which hopes that “rigorous steps will be taken to stamp
this out”.

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