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| Following suicide, prison conditions questioned |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 04/11/2006 |
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The weekend suicide of a New Hampshire man serving a life sentence for murder in a maximum security prison could have been prevented, the head of an inmate advocacy group says. Michael Keohane, of Exeter, N.H., was found hanging from a bed sheet in his cell at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Shirley at about 11:25 p.m. on Sunday, state prisons spokeswoman Diane Wiffin said. He was pronounced dead at Leominster Hospital at 12:45 a.m. on Monday, she said. Keohane, 27, left notes indicating that he was distraught about a personal relationship with someone outside the prison, she said. Prison officials and the Worcester district attorney's office are investigating, she said. Keohane's suicide was the fifth in the state prisons system in the past 13 months, and the second at Souza-Baranowski, according to Leslie Walker, executive director of Massachusetts Correctional Legal Services, an inmate advocacy group. "This is a high-tech, super-max prison with lights and cameras and electronic surveillance equipment," she said. "This is one building, one unit. Nothing happens in that unit without those officers knowing about it." Walker said another inmate called her and told her that Keohane had hung from the sheet for more than 30 minutes as officers and medical personnel stood outside his door. Wiffin denied that account. Medical staff started administering CPR after arriving at the cell at 11:27 p.m., EMTs responded to the prison at 11:45 and transported Keohane to the hospital at 12:15 a.m., she said. Three of the four suicides in state prisons last year, as well as the only suicide in 2004, involved inmates who had been diagnosed as mentally ill, Walker said. Keohane had no history of mental illness, Wiffin said. Walker has been advocating for better mental health treatment behind bars, including the creation of specialized units for mentally ill patients. |
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