Suicide prevention in detention

• In Event: Coerciveness, human rights, new penology and reintegration

Abstract

Although some studies have been devoted to European and national level controls over conditions of detention and prison life sentences, suicide-prevention policies remain under-researched, in particular in relation to human rights and court cases involving detainees. While some attention has been paid to national suicide-in-custody prevention policies, the main features of the United Nations and European monitoring and case law related to suicide prevention not only in prisons but also in other places of detention, including custodial, immigration and psychiatric detention facilities, have been neglected. We forge the concept of coercive “pre-suicide” conception of suicide to analyse theoretically the British approach to suicide where prevention is very close to its occurrence, to be compared with prevention of an attempted crime or even a “pre-crime” approach. In this regard, the British authorities consider attempted suicide to be one of the most significant risk factors for suicide. It hence applies a conception of coercive “pre-suicide”, characterised by the immediate intent to commit suicide and possibly materialised by attempted suicide, to predict suicide and to avoid such intent through punishment and even coercion. Thie coercive approach to suicide prevention takes the form of suicide avoidance through increasing surveillance, close detention and security measures.

Authors

• Gaëtan Cliquennois, CNRS, Université of Nantes, DCS

• Layla Skinns, University of Sheffield

• Philippa Tomczak, University of Nottingham