Search results

This paper aims to provide an overview of the Italian Ministry of Justice response to COVID-19 in Italian prisons, with particular focus on the conditions of super-maximum security (supermax) prisoners.

The paper is presented in the form of viewpoint and involves the reconciliation of peer-reviewed publications, technical documents and experts’ opinions.

The paper poses critical challenges on the risk of social inequalities and substandard of care for supermax prisoners.

Because the COVID-19 emergency represents an evolving situation, the research describes an instantaneous scenario of the problem, possibly subjected to further dynamics.

The paper rises relevant challenges in terms of equalities and human rights, which should be considered by policymakers.

The research highlights the importance of the health protection for supermax prisoners during COVID-19 as it is a State responsibility.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the paper contributes to the development of subsequent studies on the topic owing to its unique knowledge that was so far not available from previous research.

The issue of mental health and policing is a subject that has been debated from a number of different perspectives. The purpose of this paper is to report on the findings of a case study that explored mental health difficulties and vulnerability within police custody.

The design of the study was qualitative, and it utilised telephone, semi-structured interviews with all levels of the custody staff. This approach was taken because the aim of the study was to explore how people in different roles within the organisation worked to safeguard vulnerable people in custody.

The findings from this study identified a number of interesting themes that could be explored further in later studies. Overall, the respondents expressed frustration that vulnerable people find themselves in police custody for low-level crime, when it could have been avoided with improved mental health services in the community. Additionally, the findings demonstrated that despite the processes that are designed to safeguard the detainee, tensions still exist including, timely access to mental health assessments, appropriate training and support for staff and the use of appropriate adults.

Although the study was small in scale, the custody facility delivered detainee facilities for about 5,000 individuals per year. The research and information obtained supported the police lead for mental health to identify opportunities for improving the customer journey, as well as recognising the need for further research to identify how officers and staff relate to vulnerable individuals in contact with the police service.

Despite the limitations of the study, the findings have captured interesting data from a range of professionals working in one police custody suite, and therefore it presents a holistic overview of some key issues around mental health, vulnerability and safeguarding within the context of police custody.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how patients on a low security personality disorder ward experienced multi-disciplinary team (MDT) meetings, in order to suggest improvements that would benefit the patients and clinical teams.

The design was a case study where all patients on a low secure ward that specialised in personality disorders were approached to take part in the research. The study utilised non-participant observations of the MDT meeting (n=11), followed by individual interviews with the patients (n=10).

The data were subjected to a thematic analysis and this illuminated five themes relating to the patients’ experience of the MDT meetings namely, the importance of leave applications, the formality of the meetings, the opportunity to check on progress, decision-making and the importance of communication.

The findings suggest that small changes could be made to improve the patients’ experience of the MDT meeting. These included the provision of a less formal setting, ensuring a system where leave can be requested confidentially, greater transparency about the content of progress reports, and clearer communication between the MDT and the patient after the meeting.

There is limited research that has explored patients’ experiences of MDT meetings within secure forensic settings, and the use of non-participant observations of the MDT meeting followed by semi-structured interviews meant that the researcher and the patient had a shared experience that formed the basis of the later discussion.