Prison cell
small room in a prison or police station where a prisoner is held
A prison cell (also known as a jail cell) is a small room in a prison or police station where a prisoner is held. Cells greatly vary by their furnishings, hygienic services, and cleanliness, both across countries and based on the level of punishment to which the prisoner being held has been sentenced. Cells can be occupied by one or multiple prisoners depending on factors that include, but are not limited to, inmate population, facility size, resources, or inmate behavior.
Description
The International Committee of the Red Cross recommends that cells be at least 5.4 m2 (58 sq ft) in size for a single cell accommodation (one person in the cell). However, in shared or dormitory accommodations, it recommends a minimum of 3.4 m2 (37 sq ft) per person, including in cells where bunk beds are used.
Prison cells vary in size internationally from 2 m2 (22 sq ft) in Guinea, 3 m2 (32 sq ft) in Poland, 9 m2 (97 sq ft) in Germany to 10 m2 (110 sq ft) in Norway and 12 m2 (130 sq ft) in Switzerland.
Council of Europe (Strasbourg, 15 December 2015) call for a minimum standard for personal living space in prison establishments is 6 m2 of living space for a single-occupancy cell or 4 m2 (43 sq ft) of living space per prisoner in a multiple-occupancy cell for the prevention of torture and inhuman treatment.
A March 1991 federal government study of U.S. prisons reported that:
"Until recently, the Federal Bureau of Prisons based its determination of rated capacity in existing facilities on a single-bunking standard, which currently calls for providing each inmate with at least 35 square feet of unencumbered space in a single cell. This essentially translates to a cell size of roughly 65 sq ft (6.0 m2).*
*(65 sq ft (6.0 m2), minus 35 sq ft (3.3 m2) of "unencumbered space" leaves 30 sq ft (2.8 m2) of "encumbered" space, which would likely contain bed, toilet and sink - for a single inmate in a single cell)
"In practice, however, BOP has accommodated inmate population increases by double-bunking inmates in virtually all its facilities and in cells... of varying sizes, but generally in the 50 to 70 square foot range."
In the United States old prison cells are usually about 6 by 8 feet (1.8 by 2.4 m) in dimension which is 48 sq ft (4.5 m2), (moreover, however, American Correctional Association standards call for a minimum of 70 sq ft (6.5 m2), with steel or brick walls and one solid or barred door that locks from the outside.
The public source identifies “Prison cell” as small room in a prison or police station where a prisoner is held. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Prison, cell and small.
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This entry incorporates text from “Prison cell” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.