Supreme Court justices issued an order nisi (a show cause order) on 26.5.05 obligating the state to explain within 60 days why it does not provide a bed for every prisoner. The order was issued by justices Ayala Procaccia, Edmond Levy, and Salim Joubran, in response to a petition submitted by ACRI and PHR, a year ago, to demand that every prisoner and detainee be provided with a bed, and to prohibit the practice of forcing prisoners to sleep on the floor. The petition was submitted by Attorney Dori Spivak from Tel-Aviv University’s Law Faculty”s Human Rights Program, and a member of ACRI’s board.
Justice Procaccia, who headed the panel of judges, stated that the response to the petition is insufficient and that a timetable must be set up that is clear and obligatory, and which results in every prisoner in Israel being provided with a bed to sleep in. The judge recommended a time frame of a year to resolve the issue, but the state”s refusal through state representative, Attorney Anar Helman, to commit to this timetable, resulted in the court issuing an order nisi.
On 1.6.04, the final injunction issued by the Supreme Court in June 2003 in response to a previous petition on a similar issue that was submitted by Attorney Spivak on behalf of PHR, came into effect. The injunction prohibits the practice of forcing detainees to sleep on the floor. In the current petition the court is asked to take the next step to protect the basic rights of the incarcerated population, and to ensure the realization of the legal right of all prisoners to sleep in a bed. Attorney Spivak notes in the opening of the petition, that the state already declared its intention to the Supreme Court to recognize the right of every prisoner to a bed as a legal right that derives directly from the legal right to dignity. The state repeated this statement in its submitted response to the current petition. Despite this, Attorney Spivak adds, the Israel Prison Service (IPS) continues to bed prisoners on the floor in extremely overcrowded conditions. According to an amended statement by the state that was submitted to the Supreme Court prior to the hearing of the current petition, it stated that on 22.5.05, 392 prisoners were sleeping on the floor.
Attorney Spivak further emphasizes in the petition that the conditions of severe overcrowding in the prisons, and the practice of bedding prisoners on the floor, has profound implications on the physical, mental and behavioral health of the prisoners. The issue is not just one of providing a comfortable sleeping arrangement, he adds, the moment that the mattresses are laid on the floor between existing beds in the cell, a situation is created in which the cell”s inhabitants are almost unable to move. This in turn provides fertile ground for potentially violent physical and verbal confrontations between prisoners. Moreover, the ongoing tensions and the lack of minimal personal living space exacerbate the emotional distress of those residing in the cell. These claims are supported both by statements made by the former IPS Commissioner, Orit Adato, that appears in the petition, and in a statement of opinion written by Psychiatric expert, Dr. Zeev Weiner. Dr Weiner concurs with these statements and bases his support on evidence gathered by numerous research studies that focused on the mental health of prisoners. According to the statement of opinion, extremely difficult prison conditions, which include overcrowding and a lack of privacy, are liable to increase the danger significantly, which is already high, of prisoners becoming mentally ill, even to the point of suicide and the development of psychiatric syndromes, in some cases chronic, that can cause them to be severely functionally impaired.
Attorney Spivak also notes that the right of a prisoner to reasonable prison conditions, including a bed for the night, is protected by the Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty, both through a number of Supreme Court rulings, and through the provisions of international law, irrespective of a particular state”s financial difficulties. He further emphasizes that in addition to the practice of bedding prisoners on the floor, there is an extremely serious problem of overcrowding: each prisoner in Israel is designated an area of between 2.5-3 square meters (according to 2002 statistics), in comparison to 7-12 square meters in most western countries. It should also be noted that the prison conditions were severely criticized by the Chairman of the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee, M.K. Michael Eitan, who stated on 10.5.04 during a committee meeting, that, in a just state it is inconceivable that individuals that are sentenced to a term in jail are forced to sleep on the floor.
