The Eighth Amendment requires that state and federal prison systems provide at least “the minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities.” (Rhodes v. Chapman, 452 U.S. 337 (1981); see Do prison inmates have any rights?) Because this rule is so vague, prisons can be deficient in a variety of ways yet still meet minimum constitutional standards.
To prove that prison conditions are cruel and unusual under the U.S. Constitution, prisoners must show that they were forced to live with seriously hazardous or oppressive conditions; this is an objective test that looks at the conditions themselves. They must also establish that prison officials were deliberately indifferent to the conditions, a subjective question that considers the state of mind of the officials responsible for them. (Wilson v. Seiter, 501 U.S. 294 (1991).)
Examples of inadequate prison conditions include:
- overcrowding
- lack of supplies necessary for personal hygiene, such as soap and water
- unsanitary food preparation
- nutritionally inadequate food
- lack of access to medical treatment and poor medical care
- failure to protect prisoners’ physical safety
- substandard shelter, such as lack of adequate heating, cooling, clothing, and blankets
- unsafe building conditions, such as exposed wiring and vermin infestation
- inadequate facilities for prisoners put in solitary confinement
- lack of opportunities for prisoners to get physical exercise, and
- inadequate opportunities for prisoners to access the courts, such as a prison law library that has few books or is unavailable to prisoners in solitary confinement.
A condition may be improper even if it affects only a small group of prisoners. For example, prison officials may violate both the First (free exercise of religion) and the Eighth (freedom from cruel and unusual punishment) Amendments if they do not provide pork-free meals to prisoners whose religions forbid eating pork, even if the non-pork-eaters make up a minority of the population.
