A1) Identify the link between imprisonment and suicide [10]
Imprisonment very often has negative effects on offenders, in some cases they turn into victims of abuse themselves. Prison causes psychological distress, through overcrowding and bullying. This can lead to offenders self-harming and in many cases it can lead to suicide, which is more common in prison than the general population.
Deaths in prison can be given various rulings by the coroner such as suicide (the prisoner had the intention to kill themselves), death by misadventure (accidental death) which in some instances can be self-harm gone wrong, and open verdicts. Dooley et al wanted to examine the unnatural deaths that occurred in prisons in England and Wales from 1972 and 1987.
This research was in the form of a content analysis of prison department personal papers of prisoners’ records. Dooley compared verdicts of suicide with verdicts of unnatural causes or death by misadventure rulings.
The research found that 300 suicides occurred in the time frame, 52 of which were due to self-inflicted harm gone wrong. There was little difference between the suicide group and the group that had self-harmed. However there were some real differences. For example, it was found that the prisoners who committed suicide were more likely to do so at night (this is so there is a less likely chance of them being caught in the act) and that the self-harm gone wrong group were more likely to be found during the daytime (this is because their incidents of self-harm were more likely a call for attention). It was also found that the suicide group had no previous history of self-harming; this could be due to those prisoners having an actual intention of dying. Self-harming for a long time without committing suicide is more likely to be a replacement of emotional pain with physical pain which is a long term coping