The Death Of Timothy Souders

Scott Pelley On The Plight Of The Mentally Ill Behind Bars

(CBS)  Walsh did an extensive study of Michigan prisons and found that the staff often tries to punish psychotic inmates into better behavior.

Incredibly, he found in a number of cases, the staff insists inmates are not mentally ill, despite profound insanity.

"One man, he enucleated his eyes, cut 'em out, because he felt they were offending God. These were men that were, claimed to be manipulative, malingerers and non-mentally ill," says Walsh.

"Wait a minute. Did I just understand you to say that the department of corrections declared those men not mentally ill?" Pelley asks.

"The staff did. That's correct. The psychiatric and psychological staff considered, considered them to be malingerers and manipulators that went to extremes," Walsh says.

After his arrest, a state psychologist said Souders was trying to manipulate the staff when he stabbed himself seven times in the stomach in a suicide attempt. Months later, in solitary, there was no psychiatric intervention, even when Souders was raving.

A social worker wanted him transferred to a hospital, but the paperwork never got done. The guards resorted again to chains, which the federal judge overseeing the prison criticized as “punitive restraints.”

"We do not actually use punitive restraints. We use restraints," says Patricia Caruso, the director of Michigan's prison system. "Punitive implies restraints for punishment. Restraints are never used for punishment. Restraints are used for protection. They are used for the protection of the prisoner of harming himself, or for the protection of others who are being harmed by the prisoner."

But Tim Souders wasn’t harming anyone and a prison report shows it was his attempt to break the stool and flood his cell that led to the authorization to put him in top-of-bed restraints.

"It depends on you how long you’re in these, okay? Can’t flood your cell, can’t do that type of stuff. We put you in restraints to kind of control your behavior," an officer told Tim.

"We've seen cases where people have been in restraints on and off, day after day after day. And I have not found a mental health expert who has told me that that's a good idea," Pelley tells Caruso.

"It is on and off. People are removed from restraints. Even prior to that, people [are] removed from restraints at a maximum of every two hours. And would get up and walk around," she replies.

Two hours? 60 Minutes checked the surveillance tape. Souders was up some of the time, but 60 Minutes found he was restrained for stretches of 12 hours, 16 hours, and 17 hours.

Tim Souders had bed sores and on the third day in restraints, he resisted for the first and only time, complaining bitterly about the hours in chains.

"I'm tired of this. Eighteen hours is not justified," Souders could be heard saying on the videotape.

Recently, Michigan's corrections director Patricia Caruso suggested limiting the total time in restraints to six hours.

"Federal judge describe that as trading six hours of evil for unlimited evil. Evil is evil, he’s saying. You're smiling," Pelley remarks.

"No. I'm…I don't—," says Caruso.

"Surely you take that seriously," Pelley asks.

"I absolutely take that seriously. Prison is a difficult environment. I have correctional officers, who become accustomed to having urine and feces thrown on them by prisoners, who have prisoners who are so injurious that they will open their bodies to remove organs from others. And so we have to rely on our responsibility to keep people safe," says Caruso.