Home › Research Library › Georgia's Tier Segregation System: Tier I, Tier II, Tier III/SMU and the STEP Programs — Architecture, Conditions, Scale, and the Solitary Confinement Population GDC Does Not Publish
Solitary Confinement and Restrictive Housing

Georgia's Tier Segregation System: Tier I, Tier II, Tier III/SMU and the STEP Programs — Architecture, Conditions, Scale, and the Solitary Confinement Population GDC Does Not Publish

363 Data Points 177 Sources 103 Entities Research Date: Sep 13, 2026
A GPS open-records request (R031710-091426) filed 2026-09-14 and fulfilled by GDC on 2026-10-02 produced the first per-facility count of Georgia's Tier II population GPS holds from GDC, along with Tier III and STEP bed/occupancy figures. The undated snapshot shows 8 Tier II prisons with 884 beds and 804 occupied (91.0%), a single Tier III Special Management Unit with 160 beds and 128 occupied, and 4 STEP locations with 119 beds and 96 occupied — 1,163 beds and 1,028 occupied across all three programs. The production lacks an as-of date and does not split STEP between Tier II STEP and Tier III STEP, and GDC reported beds rather than offender counts.

Where this research is used

This page is a research collection: individual facts drawn from the sources listed further down, each traced to where it came from. A research topic brings many collections together into one overview of an issue. The facts on this page feed these 11 topics; open one to see how they fit with the rest of the evidence.

Facility Conditions & Infrastructure
Georgia's prison system runs on a physical plant the state's own consultants, auditors and legislators describe as past the end of its useful life: an average prison age above 30 years, 29 of 34 institutions flagged in a January 2023 internal evaluation as needing critical upgrades, and a documented set of failures — broken cell locks, sewage in living areas, mold, failed HVAC, non-functional fire systems — that the Department of Justice in October 2024 found produced unconstitutional conditions. Overcrowding, measured against original design capacity, is the multiplier: facilities built for 750 people hold more than 1,600, the diagnostic prison operates at roughly five times its 500-bed design, and triple-bunking leaves people about nine square feet each. Georgia's response has been a $600 million-plus infrastructure infusion paired with a new 3,000-bed prison, a plan whose own proponents say will take years longer than the funding window it rests on.
8,250 data points
Georgia's Tier Segregation System
Georgia operates a four-stage segregation ladder — Tier I, Tier II, Tier III (the Special Management Unit), and the STEP step-down — built in August 2013 and never quantified by GDC as a population. GDC publishes only the Tier III population, because the SMU happens to be carried as a standalone facility, and stopped publishing any restrictive-housing trend figure after FY2019. Every per-facility count in this page comes from a dated document and is a cell count, a bed count, or a point-in-time occupancy figure — never the number of people who passed through.
725 data points
Healthcare & Medical Neglect
Georgia's prison healthcare system fails the constitutional floor on a documented, repeated basis: the federal Department of Justice concluded in October 2024 that medical care in Georgia prisons is 'abhorrent,' 'life-threatening' and unconstitutional, with people waiting months for treatment and roughly 10% of those with Hepatitis C or HIV receiving it. The state has outsourced the duty to a succession of contractors — Georgia Correctional HealthCare until 2021, Wellpath for three years, and Centurion Health since July 2024 under a $2.40 billion nine-year contract — while the Health program appropriation reached $432,247,728 for fiscal year 2027. What the record leaves is a delivery system that cannot staff itself, a mortality record the Department stopped explaining in March 2024, and named dead people whose settlements the state pays years later.
4,808 data points
Legal Standards & Case Law
Georgia's prison conditions are governed by a dense layer of Eighth Amendment doctrine, a federal statute designed to make prison litigation fail, and a set of Georgia cases that once ran the state's prisons under federal supervision. The doctrinal floor is clear enough — Estelle, Rhodes, Wilson, Helling and Farmer — but the Eleventh Circuit's application of it, tightened further by Wade v. McDade in 2024, produces one of the hardest deliberate indifference standards in the country. This page sets out what must be proved, what relief a court can order, what Georgia's own litigation history shows, and where the record still runs out.
8,512 data points
Oversight & Accountability
Georgia runs one of the largest prison systems in the United States with no independent body empowered to inspect it, and every internal mechanism that might substitute for outside oversight — the Board of Corrections, the Office of Professional Standards, the inmate grievance system, PREA audits, ACA accreditation, and the department's own mortality reviews — is staffed, funded, and answered to by the agency it would police. The result is a documented pattern in which the only functioning accountability actor has been the federal government: a Justice Department investigation opened in 2016, expanded twice, and concluded in October 2024 with a finding that Georgia's prisons violate the Eighth Amendment, followed by no consent decree, no enforcement action, and no new federal prosecution of prison staff. This page collects what the record shows about how oversight fails in Georgia, how the failures are measured, and what the evidence says an actual oversight mechanism would require.
16,182 data points
Policy & Advocacy
Georgia's policy and advocacy landscape is defined by a paradox: a decade of bipartisan sentencing reform that measurably reduced incarceration and racial disparity, followed by a sharp reversal toward prison construction, surveillance technology, and record spending attached to no independent oversight. Legislative victories on wrongful conviction compensation, survivor justice, and out-of-time appeals sit alongside bills that died in the last minutes of session — an independent prison ombudsman, restrictive housing limits, parole transparency — and a post-conviction system the Chief Justice of Georgia calls 'a mess' that only the legislature can fix. The 2026 statewide elections and an unresolved federal investigation are the two live pressure points advocates are organizing around.
7,412 data points
Population & Demographics
Georgia holds roughly 53,000 people in state custody — the fourth-largest state prison population in the country — after a decades-long buildup, one pandemic-era collapse, and a rebound that has carried the count back toward its pre-COVID level. Black Georgians are about 31 to 33 percent of the state and 58 to 61 percent of its prisoners, and one in five people in a Georgia prison is serving a life sentence. The series that describe this population do not agree with each other, and Georgia publishes no count at all for some of the people it holds.
11,185 data points
Reform Models & Programs
Georgia operates a statewide cognitive-skills curriculum for parolees, twelve reentry and cognitive programming centers, contracted addiction treatment, step-down units inside its Tier segregation system, and an earned-time credit statute — and the national evidence base for each of those program types is unusually strong. What the record does not contain is current, published, rigorously designed outcome data for most of Georgia's own programs, and the state's direct spending on them amounts to a fraction of one percent of the prison budget. This page sets out what the research verifies, what Georgia actually runs, what it spends, what other states have achieved, and where the evidence stops.
12,091 data points
Retaliation Against People Who Speak Up
Retaliation against incarcerated people who report abuse, file grievances, or speak to outside parties is one of the most pervasive and structurally documented patterns in U.S. and Georgia prison systems. The First Amendment doctrine permits §1983 retaliation claims (Bennett v. Hendrix, 423 F.3d 1247 (11th Cir. 2005); O'Bryant v. Finch, 637 F.3d 1207 (11th Cir. 2011)), but the Prison Litigation Reform Act's exhaustion requirement creates a structural trap: the protected act (filing a grievance) is what the retaliation targets. Forms range from punitive transfers and administrative segregation to falsified disciplinary reports, denied medical care, grievance suppression, physical violence, and witness intimidation. Empirical research (Schlanger; PPI; HRW) shows post-PLRA collapse in plaintiff success rates and limited oversight against retaliation. National reform models include independent corrections ombudsmen, anonymous tip-lines, body-worn cameras, federal monitors, and statutory whistleblower regimes — though no state has yet enacted robust whistleblower protection parallel to public-employee frameworks. Georgia-specific patterns, settlement data, named officials, and survivor accounts are documented separately through GPS's case-CMS, personnel-intelligence, and intelligence-events systems.
623 data points
Solitary Confinement
Georgia confines thousands of people in a three-tier segregation system it does not call solitary confinement and does not fully count. Its written policy floors put people in Tier I and Tier II in a cell 23.3 hours a day, and its Special Management Unit has held people for years after its own experts described the harm as possibly irreversible. The published record shows the program with the weakest rules — Tier II — is more than five times the size of the unit a federal court reformed.
2,292 data points
Women's Incarceration
Georgia confines roughly 3,850 women in its state prison system — 7.46% of the total prison population, at a rate of 177 per 100,000 female residents, higher than nearly every independent nation on Earth. The system holding them is defined by three converging facts: most of these women are survivors of severe violence and primary caregivers, the prisons are unevenly used and chronically understaffed, and the state's own reporting on how they die, give birth, and receive medical care has repeatedly failed, stopped, or never existed. This page assembles GPS findings on women's population, facilities, conditions, healthcare, family separation, deaths in custody, and the 2025 Survivor Justice Act.
2,140 data points
2,721 GDC converted 2,721 beds to Tier beds at all Leve… 12 GDC operates 34 active state prisons, 12 classifi… 671 GDC reported reducing extended restrictive housin… 675 GDC's FY2019 report gives a different figure for … 303 Hays State Prison Tier I and II unit inventory: 3… 83 Hancock State Prison Tier II beds

Key Findings

The most impactful data from this research collection. Tap a card for the full finding, GPS commentary on why it matters, and its source.

All Data Points

363 verified data points extracted from primary sources.

GPS open-records request R031710-091426 filed Case detail
GPS filed open-records request R031710-091426 through the GDC open-records portal on 2026-09-14, seeking (1) facilities operating a Tier II program including Tier II STEP, (2) facilities operating a Tier III / Special Management Unit program including Tier III STEP, and (3) and (4) the number of offenders assigned to each per facility as of one date.
legal policy operations
Tier I is short-term segregation available at every GDC facility type Policy
SOP 209.07, 'Segregation - Tier I: Disciplinary, Protective Custody and Transient Housing' (reference IIB09-0002), effective 04/30/2015, revising a previous effective date of 08/01/2013. Section II, APPLICABILITY, states the policy applies to: 'All State Prisons, County CIs, Private Prisons, Intensive Treatment Facilities, Transitional Centers, Probation Detention Centers, and Probation Boot Camp housing GDC offenders or probationers.' Tier I is not limited to close-security prisons or to a designated subset of facilities. Definition, Section IV.B: 'Tier 1 Segregation Program: Program for the involuntary and voluntary placement and management of offenders in short-term segregated housing.'
solitary conditions facilities policy
GDC states Tier II is not punishment Quote
SOP 209.08, Section I, 'Introduction and Summary': 'The Tier II program is a part of a comprehensive facility-wide stratification plan that will manage the institutional conduct and programmatic need of the assigned population. The purpose of creating an effective stratification plan is to enhance staff's ability to safely and efficiently manage offenders in designated beds, buildings and during movement. This Tier II Program policy establishes the criteria and guidelines for assigning offenders into the program. This program is an offender management process and is not a punishment measure.' The published summary of SOP 209.08 restates it: the policy 'applies to designated Georgia Department of Corrections facilities and is not a punishment measure but rather an offender management and stratification process.' SOP 209.06's published summary likewise states: 'The policy emphasizes that segregation is not a form of abuse or punishment.'
solitary policy tier
GDC converted 2,721 beds to Tier beds at all Level V facilities in FY2014 Statistic
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2014 states: 'Developed and implemented the Tier Segregation Management System at all Level V facilities. As part of this system, 2,721 beds were converted to Tier beds.' This is the only system-wide quantification of the Tier system GDC has ever published. It is a BED count, not a population count. It establishes the Tier system was built at a scale of thousands of beds, not hundreds, and implemented at 'all Level V facilities.' This supplies the meaning of 'Level 5 facility' in SOP 209.08: Level V is the GDC facility security class at which the Tier Segregation Management System was installed. Caveat: this is a 2014 figure describing beds converted at implementation, not a current bed count, capacity, or count of people.
2,721 Tier beds converted statewide
solitary facilities conditions policy tier
No court finding that Georgia uses Tier placement to retaliate for protected activity Data gap
GPS has no document establishing that Georgia's Tier programmes are used to retaliate against people who file grievances, contact lawyers or the press, report staff misconduct, or otherwise speak out. No court has made a finding that Georgia uses Tier placement to retaliate for protected activity. GPS's case-law corpus returns nothing for retaliatory segregation in Georgia, but the corpus is post-conviction and habeas weighted and does not hold section 1983 conditions litigation, so its silence is not itself evidence of absence.
solitary legal policy data_gap tier
Correction: Ware State Prison PREA Audit Cycle 2 URL is not pattern-constructible Methodology note
Ware State Prison, PREA Audit Cycle 2, doc_id 262, is published at https://gdc.georgia.gov/document/prea-audit-location-report/prea-ware-audit-cycle-2/download — NOT at a 'prea-ware-sp-audit-cycle-2' address, which does not exist. GDC's own citation string reads: 'GDC, PREA Ware - Audit (Cycle 2)'. Ware Cycle 3 is doc_id 308 at https://gdc.georgia.gov/document/prea-audit-location-report/prea-ware-audit-cycle-3/download. This corrects a citation elsewhere in the GPS collection that assumed a uniform URL pattern.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
GDC health services SOP requires daily medical rounds in restrictive housing Policy
SOP 507.04.33, 'Health Evaluation of Offenders in Restrictive Housing,' effective 2022-01-31, Authority Commissioner, Health Services Division (Physical Health), PowerDMS id 106369. Section IV.A.4: 'Each offender in restrictive housing will receive a daily visit from a health care provider and have access to the health care system. These daily visits will be announced and recorded by security in the Isolation/Restrictive housing logbook.' Section IV.B.1-2: 'A licensed health care professional will make initial medical rounds of offenders placed in restrictive housing within 24-hours of placement. A licensed health care professional will make daily rounds in restrictive housing.'
solitary conditions medical policy tier
GDC operates 34 active state prisons, 12 classified Close security Statistic
As of 2026-09-13, GDC operates 34 active state prisons, of which 12 are classified Close security: Augusta State Medical Prison, Baldwin State Prison, Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison, Hancock State Prison, Hays State Prison, Macon State Prison, McRae Women's Facility, Phillips State Prison, Smith State Prison, Telfair State Prison, Valdosta State Prison, and Ware State Prison. Arrendale State Prison is classified Mixed (Close/Medium), giving thirteen facilities holding close-security prisoners. Caveat: security-level classification is a facility attribute in GDC's own data; a facility's classification does not by itself establish that it operates a Tier programme.
12 GDC state prisons classified Close security vs. 34 total active state prisons
solitary facilities demographics tier
SOP 209.08 defines moderated cells as most restrictive Tier II Phase I housing Policy
SOP 209.08, Section III.C defines 'Moderated Cells' as 'Designated cells in Tier II, Phase I, that are the most restrictive cells designed to house assaultive offenders who are violent, aggressive and refuse to comply with the Tier II conduct program requirements.' This establishes a tier below Tier II Phase 1 — a stripped-property cell class within the programme.
solitary conditions policy tier
GDC Fact Sheet quoted in PREA audits defines Tier system purpose and criteria Quote
Five PREA audits quote a 'GDC Fact Sheet, Tier Segregation System,' with four quoting identical text. The Fact Sheet states the Tier system's purpose is 'to provide greater management and implementation of programming of long-term Administrative Segregation Offenders.' Tier I is described as 'the Disciplinary, Protective Custody and Transient Housing' with eight placement grounds. Tier II is 'Administrative Segregation' with twelve eligibility criteria, including criterion 5, 'Failure in Tier I or refused to participate,' and criterion 11, 'Transfer from Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison.' The classification committee holds an Administrative Segregation hearing within 96 hours; offenders may progress through Phase 1, II and III. The Smith Cycle 2 audit adds that the classification committee reviews Tier I and II offenders once every 30 days and there is an appeal process. Three things this establishes on GDC's own authority: Tier II is administrative segregation (the audits use the two terms interchangeably); refusal to participate in Tier I is itself a ground for escalation to Tier II; and transfer from Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison is a standalone eligibility ground for long-term administrative segregation.
solitary policy facilities tier
GDC full release of Tier II/III/STEP bed table Case detail
GDC uploaded a one-page table, 'Total_Beds_with_Locations_Tier_II_and_III.pdf', on 2026-10-02, stating it had 'located the documents that are responsive to your request' and that 'No charges have been assessed.' Portal status was Full Release. The PDF was created on 2026-10-02 at 17:29 EDT, about ten minutes before GDC's reply.
legal policy operations
Tier I has eight placement grounds, most requiring no disciplinary conviction Policy
SOP 209.07, Section I, POLICY. 'The Warden or Superintendent and their designee may place an offender in the Tier I Segregation Program in the following circumstances:' A. 'The offender is noted as a threat to the safe and secure operation of the Facility'; B. 'awaiting disciplinary hearing for a violation of Facility rules'; C. 'the subject of an investigation regarding a serious violation of Facility rules or regulations'; D. 'involved in incidents involving excessive destruction of state property'; E. 'the subject of a pending criminal investigation or has a pending criminal charge and is awaiting trial in State of Federal Court'; F. 'requests admission to the Tier I Program for protective custody, or the staff determines that admission to or continuation in the Tier Segregation Program is necessary for the offender's own protection'; G. 'awaiting a pending transfer or is in holdover status during the transfer process'; H. 'has not been classified due to their arrival at a Facility.' Only ground B presupposes a pending disciplinary charge, and none requires a disciplinary conviction. Grounds A, C, and H permit segregation on a staff determination alone. Ground H means a person can be held in segregated housing purely because they have just arrived and have not yet been classified.
solitary policy legal
GDC discipline policy routes disciplinary isolation past 30 days into Tier II Finding
SOP 209.01, 'Offender Discipline,' effective 11/06/2017, Facilities Division. PowerDMS id 105928. Section W, 'Limitation on Disciplinary Isolation,' within the part of the SOP that governs 'Authorized Sanctions' and states that 'The imposition of any sanction requires that the offender first be found to have committed a prohibited act': '1. 30-Day Limit for Prisons and Transitional Centers: Confinement to an isolation cell more than thirty (30) consecutive days shall not be imposed; 2. If isolation time imposed exceeds thirty (30) days due to being necessary to control and encourage behavioral change, a recommendation for placement of the offender in the Tier II program is warranted; and 3. 14-Day Limit for PDCs and ITFs: Confinement to an isolation cell more than fourteen (14) days shall not be imposed.' Significance: GDC's disciplinary policy designates Tier II as the mechanism for continuing confinement when the disciplinary-isolation limit has been reached — that is, Tier II is written into the discipline SOP as the route around the 30-day sanction cap, in a section whose stated premise is a finding of guilt. This is in direct tension with SOP 209.08's statement that Tier II 'is not a punishment measure.'
solitary policy legal tier
GDC reported reducing extended restrictive housing population by 41 percent (671 people) since January 2017 Statistic
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2018, under 'EXTENDED RESTRICTIVE HOUSING REDUCTION': 'During FY 2018, GDC continued to reduce the Restrictive Housing population. This was accomplished through the use of Specialized Protective Custody (PC) Housing and Specialized Mental Health Treatment Units (S.M.H.T.U.), Segregated Transition Education Program (S.T.E.P.), administrative reviews, changes in offender discipline process, and restructuring of policies and procedures. Since January 2017, the number of offenders in extended restrictive housing has decreased by 41 percent (671).' This is GDC's own acknowledgement that its extended restrictive housing population was large enough to require a reduction programme. Note the shape of the disclosure: a delta with no endpoints. GDC reports how many people left and what percentage that was, and never states the population before or after. Internal inconsistency: the Commissioner's letter attributes the same 41 percent reduction to FY2018 alone, while the body attributes it to the roughly eighteen months since January 2017.
671 people removed from extended restrictive housing vs. 41 percent reduction since January 2017
solitary policy demographics tier
GPS internal coding schema has no Tier value, collapsing all segregation types into one code Data gap
GPS's internal case file records alleged courses of retaliation in which segregation was the method, but the corpus almost never distinguishes a Tier programme from generic segregation or isolation. Of the distinct alleged courses in which segregation is coded as the method, exactly one names a Tier programme, and that one concerns a death on Tier II rather than a retaliatory placement onto Tier. The internal coding schema has no Tier value. The retaliation method field offers 'segregation' and nothing finer, so Tier I, Tier II, Tier III, disciplinary isolation and administrative segregation all collapse into a single code. The data model cannot answer the question as asked.
solitary legal data_gap tier
Correction: Hancock State Prison PREA Audit Cycle 2 URL is not pattern-constructible Methodology note
Hancock State Prison, PREA Audit Cycle 2, doc_id 269, is published at https://gdc.georgia.gov/document/prea-audit-location-report/prea-hancock-audit-cycle-2/download — NOT at a 'prea-hancock-sp-audit-cycle-2' address. GDC's citation string reads: 'GDC, PREA Hancock - Audit (Cycle 2)'. Hancock Cycle 3 is doc_id 311 at .../prea-hancock-audit-cycle-3/download, while Hancock Cycle 4 IS published with the 'sp' segment, at .../prea-hancock-sp-audit-cycle-4/download. This corrects a citation elsewhere in the GPS collection that assumed a uniform URL pattern.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Tier I SOP requires medical rounds only three times weekly, excluding weekends and holidays Policy
SOP 209.07 (Tier I), Section VI.F.2: 'Health Care officials will conduct an initial medical round or visit within the first 24 hours after placement and then at a minimum of three times a week excluding weekends and holidays at State Facilities/Centers; and at least once every 72 hours at County Correctional Facilities/Centers.'
solitary conditions medical policy tier
All facilities with documented Tier programme housing are close-security prisons Finding
A review of all 273 GDC-published PREA facility audit reports found named Tier programme housing — Tier I, Tier II, Tier III, 'Tier Program dorms', 'Tier units' — in the audits of exactly nine facilities: Georgia State Prison, Smith, Hays, Valdosta, Telfair, Macon, Hancock, Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison, and Ware. All nine are close-security prisons. There is not one exception in 273 documents. The nine are the seven designated Tier I and II facilities (Hancock, Hays, Macon, Smith, Telfair, Valdosta, Ware), plus Georgia State Prison (closed 2022-02-19) and Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison (which hosts Tier III, the Special Management Unit).
solitary facilities policy tier operations
Moderated cell placement limits property to state-issued basic items excluding boots Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.L.1-2 states: 'An exception may arise when an offender is placed in a moderated cell due to disruptive behavior that threatens or is potentially detrimental to the safety of staff or the welfare of the facility. Only State-Issued Property excluding offender boots (replaced by shower shoes) shall be issued. When assigned to a moderated cell, an offender's property is limited to the basic issue to include limitations of foot gear.'
solitary conditions policy tier
Discrepancy: Fact Sheet describes no Tier III; only GDCP Cycle 3 audit references Tier III Finding
The Fact Sheet as quoted describes no Tier III, and its 'Phase 1, II and III' are phases WITHIN Tier II. The only Tier III reference in the entire 273-document PREA corpus is the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison Cycle 3 audit, which states: 'The Tier III program consists of five phases (level five being the most restrictive) based on an increased level of privileges for demonstrated appropriate offender behavior and program compliance.' The two descriptions cannot be reconciled from these documents.
solitary policy facilities tier
GDC reported beds rather than offender counts Methodology note
GDC produced a table of Total Beds, Occupied Beds, Vacant Beds and Occupied % for each program location rather than a count of 'offenders assigned' as requested; occupied beds is the nearest measure to the count requested.
policy operations
Tier I is capped at 30 days, except protective custody, which is uncapped Policy
SOP 209.07, Section VI.H.2: 'For offenders assigned to the Tier I Program, the length of time cannot exceed thirty (30) days from the date of assignment, to include investigation and disciplinary isolation time. The only exceptions are offenders who are in voluntary protective custody or involuntary protective custody status.' The 30-day cap is the only outer time limit anywhere in the adult Tier architecture, and it is disapplied for protective custody. A person in protective custody, including INVOLUNTARY protective custody imposed by staff, may be held in Tier I segregation with no policy time limit at all.
solitary policy legal
Administrative Segregation expressly houses people serving disciplinary sanctions Policy
SOP 209.06, Section IV.A, listing the grounds for Administrative Segregation placement, ground 7: 'Serving sanctions for a violation of Facility/Center rules.' Ground 2: 'Awaiting a disciplinary hearing for violation of Facility/Center rules.' Ground 3: 'Awaiting investigation of a serious violation.' Note following the list: 'Offenders may be placed in Administrative Segregation after consideration of Alternative Sanctions pursuant to SOP 209.01, Offender Discipline.' Significance: the policy whose summary states that segregation 'is not a form of abuse or punishment' lists, among its own placement grounds, that the person is serving a disciplinary sanction.
solitary policy legal tier
GDC's FY2019 report gives a different figure for the same reduction Statistic
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2019, under 'TIER REDUCTION': 'The purpose of this project is to reduce the Restrictive Housing population to align with the national standards. The reduction in the Restrictive Housing population is done by ensuring that only offenders requiring intensive supervision are in the TIER program. ... TIER 2 SCRIBE module went live March 2019 to effectively track offenders in Extended Restrictive Housing ... 675 offenders were moved out of Extended Restrictive Housing.' And: 'Facilities Division has reduced the Extended Restrictive Housing population by 40% (675) since January 2017.' FY2018 reports 41 percent and 671 people since January 2017; FY2019 reports 40 percent and 675 people since the same January 2017 baseline. The two statements are not reconcilable to a single baseline. Caution: back-solving a baseline from these percentages yields approximately 1,640 from the FY2018 pair and approximately 1,690 from the FY2019 pair. Those are GPS arithmetic performed on two inconsistent agency statements. They must never be cited as a GDC-published population figure.
675 people moved out of extended restrictive housing vs. 40 percent reduction since January 2017
solitary policy demographics tier
Records that would settle the Tier retaliation question Methodology note
For any individual where Tier is named, the SCRIBE Tier assignment record and the Classification Committee 90-day review forms (SOP 209.08 Attachments 5 and 6) set against that person's grievance filing dates — the sequencing of those two documents is the entire question. In aggregate: Tier II and Tier III placements by facility and month, cross-tabulated against grievance filings by the same individuals, and the Director of Field Operations' Tier release decisions with stated reasons. For Tier III, SOP 209.09 effective 6/18/2026 sends a recommendation to release a person to Tier III STEP to the Deputy Director, Field Operations (or designee) for approval, and sends a disapproval to the Director, Field Operations for a final review and recommendation.
solitary legal policy tier
GPS rule: never construct GDC PREA audit URLs by pattern Methodology note
GDC's PREA audit download URLs are not uniformly patterned: some carry an 'sp' segment for a state prison and some do not, and the same facility can differ between cycles. Rule for GPS going forward: never construct a GDC PREA audit URL by pattern. Take the source_url and citation string from the report index for the specific facility and cycle being cited.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Tier II SOP requires medical rounds three times per week, excluding weekends and holidays Policy
SOP 209.08 (Tier II), Section IV.O.2.b: 'Health Care officials shall conduct an initial medical round or visit within the first 24 hours after placement in Tier II and then three times per week excluding weekends and holidays.'
solitary conditions medical policy tier
PREA audits explicitly state Tier programme and close-security linkage Finding
Several PREA audits state the Tier-close security linkage in terms: Valdosta State Prison Cycle 2 — 'In addition to it being a close security prison, it also houses specialized units called Tier Programs'; Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 — 'This facility is a close security institution ... it houses offenders in the Tier I and II Programs'; Smith State Prison Cycle 2 — 'The facility is also a Tier 1 and Tier II facility ... primarily housing close security offenders'; Telfair State Prison Cycle 2 — 'The facility is a Tier I and Tier II Facility'; Hancock State Prison Cycle 3 — 'The facility is a "close security" facility' together with 'G-1 is what is known as a "Tier 2" unit'.
solitary facilities policy tier operations
Eight enumerated grounds for moderated-cell placement include non-violent refusals Policy
SOP 209.08 lists reasons for moderated-cell placement: 'a. Offender projecting items/bodily fluid; b. Offender refusing to allow tray flap to be closed; c. Offender refusing to be cuffed for staff to enter or for offender to leave cell; d. Offender is assaultive towards staff; e. Offender flooding cell/breaking sprinkler head; f. Offender damaging cell/damaging state property/damaging items within his cell; g. Offender setting fire to his property or cell; and h. Continuous violations of policy, rules, & regulations while assigned to Tier II.' Several grounds, notably refusing to allow the tray flap to be closed and refusing to be cuffed, are non-violent refusals; ground (h) is open-ended and disciplinary in character.
solitary conditions policy tier
Hays State Prison Tier I and II unit inventory: 303 stated Tier beds Statistic
Hays State Prison, PREA Audit Cycle 2, report dated 2019-06-15. The audit states: 'This is a Tier I & II facility. ... Tier I and II segregation units are utilized for Protective Custody and problematic offenders. ... Hays is comprised of three units to include the main compound (G.P.), Tier 1, and Tier II. Tier I (short term segregation) consist of E building and D-2. TIER II (long term segregation) consists of F, G, and H building.' Unit-by-unit inventory: (D2) 2-man cells with capacity of 64 inmates (Tier 1) Protective Custody/two officers assigned 24/7; E Unit/two dorms (Tier 1 short-term segregation/30 days) with capacity of 64/two officers 24/7; F Unit with two pod-style dorms, F1 (Tier 2 long-term segregation/270 days) one-man cells with capacity 32 inmates, F2 (Tier 2) one-man cells with 32 inmates; G Unit with two pod-style dorms G1 (Tier 2 long-term segregation/270 days) one-man cells with 32 inmates, G2 (Tier 2) one-man cells with 32 inmates; H Unit with two dorms, one-man and two-man cells that house a maximum of 47 inmates, H1 (Tier 2 Stepdown Unit) H2 (Tier 2 Stepdown Unit) one-man cells with 47 inmates. Stat value: 303 Tier beds stated across Tier I and Tier II units (D2 64 + E 64 + F 64 + G 64 + H 47). Significance: one close-security prison's Tier units held a stated capacity of 303 — larger than the entire Tier III Special Management Unit, whose published monthly population has ranged from 149 to 195. The audit also documents the occupancy split: Tier I units at Hays are two-man cells, and Tier II units are one-man cells. This is the only audit in the corpus that names a step-down unit by name, 'Tier 2 Stepdown Unit,' at H1 and H2. The audit describes Tier II as 'long-term segregation/270 days,' which appears nowhere in SOP 209.08 — the SOP states no duration at all. Macon's Cycle 2 and Cycle 4 audits describe Tier II as running 'from nine months to indefinite' and 'from 270 days to an indefinite date' respectively. Recorded as audit-reported, and as the only duration figure for Tier II in any GDC document GPS holds.
303 Tier beds vs. 195 Tier III Special Management Unit maximum published monthly population
solitary facilities conditions tier
Hancock State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Hancock State Prison had 83 Tier II total beds, 82 occupied, 1 vacant, 98.80% occupied.
83 beds vs. 82 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier I review structure — 96-hour hearing, 7-day counselor check, 30-day committee review Policy
SOP 209.07, Section VI.B: after involuntary assignment, 'the Warden/Superintendent shall ensure the Classification Committee holds a formal hearing within ninety-six (96) hours after the offender is placed in the Tier I Program.' Section IV.A defines the decider: 'For purposes of the Tier I Segregation Program, the Classification Committee will consist of the Unit Manager, Tier I OIC, assigned counselor and as applicable, the assigned mental health counselor.' All four members are facility staff; there is no external or Central Office member. Section VI.G: the offender's counselor 'shall review the offender's well-being and mental status every seven (7) days' and report to the Warden; 'The counselor need not convene a formal hearing for this review and report.' Section VI.H.1: the Classification Committee 'shall conduct a 30 Day Review of all offenders in the Tier I Program' to determine whether the offender will 'a. Remain in the Tier I Program; b. Return to General Population; or c. Be assigned to the Tier II Program: Administrative Segregation.' Appeal: Section VI.D.4 — written objections to the Warden/Superintendent within three business days; Warden completes review within ten business days; 'The Warden's/Superintendent's final decision will be sent to the respective Field Operations Manager.'
solitary policy legal
The 24-hour initial administrative-segregation review cannot be appealed Policy
SOP 209.06, Section IV.E.2: 'Within 24-hours of initial placement in Administrative Segregation, the Deputy Warden/Assistant Superintendent/Unit Manager/Duty Officer shall determine one of the following regarding the offender's status: a. Return the offender to the appropriate housing unit, or b. Order the offender to remain in Administrative Segregation.' Note: 'Offender initial placement shall be approved by a person of higher authority than the person who ordered the initial placement in Administrative Segregation within 24 hours. The higher authority shall not have been involved in the initial placement of the offender.' Section IV.E.3: that decision 'will not be subject to appeal by the offender.' Section IV.F: the 96-hour Classification Committee hearing follows; the offender may request 'an employee who is on duty and willing to represent the offender,' and may request witnesses, which 'the Classification Committee will have the discretion to call.' Appeal lies to the Warden within three business days, and Section IV.F.5: 'The Warden's/Superintendent's review and decision on the appeal is final.' Significance: the first 96 hours of segregation rest on a decision that the policy makes unappealable, and the appeal that does exist terminates with the Warden. There is no neutral or external decision-maker anywhere in the process, and no right to counsel or to a non-staff advocate.
solitary policy legal tier
GDC built a SCRIBE module and Warden's Dashboard that track Tier II placement and days served Policy
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2019: 'TIER 2 SCRIBE module went live March 2019 to effectively track offenders in Extended Restrictive Housing.' GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2020, under 'RESTRICTIVE HOUSING': 'The Restrictive Housing Program, or Tier II, was established to protect staff, offenders, and the public... In FY 2020, the following was added to the SCRIBE Warden's Dashboard for Tier II offenders: transfer process, on-hold changes, phases of the referral process, and number of days an offender has spent in restrictive housing Tier II.' This is decisive for open-records purposes: GDC has stated in its own published annual reports that since March 2019 it has operated a dedicated SCRIBE module to track people in extended restrictive housing, and that since FY2020 the Warden's Dashboard displays, for Tier II offenders, the number of days each person has spent in Tier II. The data therefore exists in an electronic system of record maintained by the agency.
solitary policy data_gap tier
GPS retaliation assessment methodology: keyword screen limits and double-counting risk Methodology note
Every row of GPS's submissions and case-entry tables has been assessed for retaliation, so there is no unassessed backlog. However, roughly two-fifths of the negative determinations rest on a keyword screen rather than a substantive review, and a keyword screen will systematically miss an episode described without the screened vocabulary. Any count derived from this corpus is therefore a floor, not a measurement. Counts must also distinguish hand-verified courses from heuristically keyed ones, which behave as an upper bound because restatements of a single episode with differing method signatures can double-count. This corpus is internal; anything derived from it that reaches a public surface must be an aggregate count only, never narrative and never a combination of facility, date and method fine enough to identify a person in custody.
solitary legal data_gap tier
Hancock State Prison G-1 'Tier 2' unit houses maximum 96 inmates in double-occupancy cells Statistic
Hancock State Prison PREA Audit Cycle 2 (doc_id 269) and Cycle 3 (doc_id 311) both state, in identical words: "G-1 is what is known as a 'Tier 2' unit. This is a specialized management program housing a maximum of 96 inmates, in double occupancy cells located on two tiers." This is an explicit statement, repeated across two audit cycles, that a Tier II unit houses 96 people two to a cell — the clearest single documentary confirmation that Georgia's long-term administrative segregation programme is operated as double-celled confinement. The phrase 'located on two tiers' is architectural (upper and lower galleries of the cellblock), not a reference to the Tier programme.
96 maximum inmates in Hancock State Prison's G-1 Tier 2 unit, double occupancy
solitary conditions facilities tier
Conflict between daily and three-times-weekly medical rounds in GDC Tier policies Finding
The Health Services SOP 507.04.33 (2022) sets a daily medical rounds standard for restrictive housing, while Tier I SOP 209.07 (2015) and Tier II SOP 209.08 (2016) set three times per week and expressly exclude weekends and holidays. Three visits a week is fewer than half of seven. A person in Tier II whose unit follows SOP 209.08 receives medical rounds on three weekdays; the same person under SOP 507.04.33 is entitled to seven. GDC has not harmonised the two, and the older, less protective standard is the one written into the policy that governs the Tier unit itself.
solitary conditions medical policy tier
Of 12 active close-security prisons, 9 have documented Tier programme housing Finding
Of the twelve currently active close-security state prisons, nine have documented Tier programme housing: the seven facilities GDC's fact sheet designates as Tier I and II, Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison, and McRae Women's Facility, whose 34-bed Tier II unit appears in GDC's bed table produced 2026-10-02 in open-records request R031710-091426. The three close-security prisons whose audits contain no Tier language are Baldwin State Prison (whose audits describe K1, K2 and K3 as 'Isolation/Segregation' and never as Tier), Phillips State Prison (which reports 100 isolation/segregation cells with no Tier language), and Augusta State Medical Prison.
solitary facilities policy tier
SOP 209.08 cross-references SOP 209.05 for bedding supplies in moderated/strip cells Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.D.1.d routes the question of what a person in a moderated cell is given to another policy: 'If an offender is placed in a moderated-cell/strip-cell, SOP 209.05 (IIB08-0005) and Post Orders will govern what bedding supplies are provided.' SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.d does the same for juveniles.
solitary conditions policy tier
Georgia State Prison: 13 Tier dorms and 424 stated Tier beds Statistic
Georgia State Prison, PREA Audit Cycle 1, onsite 2016-05-10 to 11: the prison comprised '17 general population dorms and 13 Tier Program dorms.' Georgia State Prison, PREA Audit Cycle 2, report dated 2019-03-22: 'This facility is a close security institution, housing some of the State's most difficult inmates but compounding the complexity of the facility is that it houses offenders in the Tier I and II Programs which are recalcitrant and difficult to manage offenders.' 'Cell blocks are organized into a general population unit, special management units (tier programs, I and II) housing an extremely difficult population, Mental Health Units, an emergency room, infirmary including a Crisis Stabilization Unit in addition to infirmary beds and a 26-bed surgical unit.' Housing inventory: 'E - North houses 104 offenders in single bunk cells and the South side houses 106 in double bunk isolation/segregation/Tier I Cells'; 'Tier II Housing Unit (G Building) houses up to 218 offenders in double bunk cells'; 'Tier II (K Building) - Houses 100 inmates in single cell lockdown cells'; and 'D East houses 49 Tier II Mental Health Offenders.' Also: 'The facility houses a large population of Tier I and Tier II offenders. These inmates are recalcitrant and spend a good portion of their sentences in segregation. ... Tier II houses the most problematic offenders and requires a minimum of one officer per dorm 24/7'; and 'Tier II is the most restrictive and offenders in this program may take up to two years to progress ... through the required phases to enable them to return to the general population.' Stat value: 424 Tier beds stated at Georgia State Prison, PREA Cycle 2 (E-South 106 + G 218 + K 100). Significance: thirteen Tier dorms at one prison, and 424 stated Tier beds — more than twice the Special Management Unit's 192. The audit documents both occupancy modes side by side in the same programme: Tier I cells at E-South are double-bunked, Tier II at G Building is double-bunked, and Tier II at K Building is 'single cell lockdown cells.' It records a duration of 'up to two years' for Tier II progression, which has no basis in SOP 209.08. Georgia State Prison closed 2022-02-19, so these figures are historical; they are recorded because they are the fullest description of a Tier II programme in any GDC document GPS holds.
424 Tier beds vs. 192 Special Management Unit stated capacity
solitary facilities conditions mental_health tier
Hays State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Hays State Prison had 151 Tier II total beds, 151 occupied, 0 vacant, 100.00% occupied.
151 beds vs. 151 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier I permits double-bunking of protective-custody prisoners, with Central Office sign-off past 72 hours Policy
SOP 209.07, Section VI.A.6: 'Double bunking of offenders in protective custody status shall occur only in emergency situations and only with the recommendation of the Facility's Classification Committee. This recommendation shall be approved by the Facility's Warden. This approval shall not exceed 72 hours. Offenders housed in this manner beyond the 72-hour time limit must be approved in writing by the Director of Facilities Operations or his/her designee.' GDC's own Tier I policy contemplates two people in one segregation cell, and creates a written approval record at Central Office level whenever that lasts beyond 72 hours. Those written approvals are a discrete, named, requestable record.
solitary conditions policy
SOP 209.08's internal numbering is defective Methodology note
In SOP 209.08 as published, Section IV runs A, B, C, D, D, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P: two consecutive sections are both lettered D (the Warden's seven-day review, and 'Conditions and Privileges'), and no section is lettered E. Section IV.C.1 instructs the Classification Committee to apply 'the eligibility criteria cited above in VI.B.1-14,' but the criteria are in Section IV.B, not VI.B, and there are thirteen of them, not fourteen. Section II lists '(209.06) IIB09-0001 - Administrative Segregation' and '(209.09) IIB09-0001- Special Management Unit: Tier III Program,' assigning the same former code IIB09-0001 to two different policies. The record-retention list in Section VI omits Attachment 4 (the Tier II Program Handout, which is the document that sets out Phase 3 privileges) and Attachment 8. Significance: a person in Tier II who tries to check the rules governing indefinite segregation against the copy in the inmate library is working from a document with duplicate section letters, a broken internal cross-reference, a miscount of the criteria that justify their confinement, and no retention rule for the handout that states their privileges.
solitary policy tier
GDC has published a cell count for the Tier units at one prison — 178 cells at Valdosta Statistic
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2018 records that Guard 1 Technology was installed at Valdosta State Prison and 'captures automated segregation rounds in all tier units (178 Cells).' A single facility's Tier units comprised 178 cells. This is a cell count for one prison, not a bed count and not a population; if any of those cells are double-bunked the bed count is higher than 178. It is the only per-facility Tier cell figure GDC has published in the annual report series, and it gives a sense of order of magnitude: one prison's Tier units alone approach the size of the entire Special Management Unit.
178 cells in all Tier units at Valdosta State Prison
solitary facilities conditions tier
Zero published GPS posts mention Tier II Finding
A keyword search for 'Tier II' across all published GPS posts returns zero results. GPS's principal published retaliation reporting — including 'The Punishment for Speaking Up in Georgia's Prisons' (post 12153) and 'Invisible Scars: Cycle of Retaliation and Abuse in Georgia Prisons' (post 4508) — contains no paragraph mentioning Tier. 'Georgia Prisons' ACA Compliance vs. Inhumane Reality' (post 3979) contains a single segregation paragraph, on sanitation against ACA standards, and no Tier material. GPS has published extensively on retaliation and on conditions without ever publishing on the Tier system.
solitary policy tier
Hancock State Prison J Building Tier 1/segregation unit has 20 double-occupancy cells Statistic
The Hancock State Prison PREA audits describe J Building as follows: "Tier 1/Segregation inmates are housed in double occupancy cells. There are 20 cells in the unit." This sits alongside the G-1 Tier 2 unit described in the same audits as housing a maximum of 96 inmates in double-occupancy cells.
20 cells in Hancock State Prison J Building Tier 1/segregation unit, double occupancy
solitary conditions facilities tier
Nurse may trigger removal from restrictive housing on health grounds Policy
SOP 507.04.33, Section IV.A.7: 'If following the review of the health record, the nurse believes that the offender's health will be adversely affected by continued placement in restrictive housing, the nurse will notify the physician. If the physician concurs, security personnel will be notified and alternate arrangements made (e.g., placement in the infirmary).' Section IV.A.8: 'Mental health personnel will evaluate offenders who have been receiving mental health treatment within 24-hours after being placed in restrictive housing with documentation of the encounter in the mental health section of the health record.' Section IV.B.5: 'After the offender is removed from restrictive housing, the restrictive housing flow sheet will be scanned into the electronic health record.'
solitary conditions medical policy tier
SOP 209.09 Section IV.A.2 classifies all Tier III offenders as Close Security Policy
SOP 209.09 Section IV.A.2 states: 'All offenders assigned to the Tier III Program are classified as Close Security'. Additionally, SOP 209.45 and SOP 209.55 classify both STEP populations as Close Security, and SOP 209.08's transfer provision refers to 'another Level 5 facility.'
solitary policy tier legal
SOP 209.05 stripped cells: emergency use only, never punishment, 8-hour initial maximum Policy
SOP 209.05, 'Stripped Cells and Temporary Confiscation of Personal Property,' effective 04/30/2015, Authority Bryson/Jacobs, reference IIB08-0005, revising a previous effective date of 02/01/2010, 5 pages. PowerDMS id 105939. The published summary states: 'Stripped cells are only to be used in emergency situations when an individual poses a risk of harm to themselves or others, or when they destroy property, never as punishment. Placement requires written authorization from the Warden or Superintendent and must include close observation, with maximum initial confinement of 8 hours and continued confinement requiring medical authorization renewed daily.'
solitary conditions medical policy legal tier
Double-bunked segregation and Tier housing documented across nine facilities Finding
In GDC's own audit language, across nine facilities: Valdosta State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier 1 is the most restrictive program, with offenders typically housed in double occupancy cells with very limited outside cell activity.' The same audit: 'There are two Tier Programs housing recalcitrant offenders who cannot managed in the general population' and 'The Tier Program also houses disciplinary segregation and protective custody.' Telfair State Prison Cycle 2: 'an isolation/segregations unit consisting of 40 single cells and 40 double-bunked cells'; 'Tier I inmates are housed in E-1 and E-2. E-1 houses 80 inmates and E-2 houses 70 inmates in two man cells. These offenders are housed up to 30 days and then released to general population or assigned to Tier II.' Smith State Prison Cycle 4, onsite from 2025-02-03: 'This dormitory houses a maximum of 192 Tier 1 offenders (96 on each side)'; 'This dormitory houses a maximum of 192 Tier 2 offenders (96 on each side)'; the dorms comprise '48 double bunked cells housing 96 offenders per dorm.' Hancock State Prison Cycle 2 and Cycle 3: 'J Building - Tier 1/Segregation inmates are housed in double occupancy cells. There are 20 cells in the unit.' Hancock State Prison Cycle 4: '[Building J] This housing unit will house 38 inmates in a combination of single and double cell bunks.' Ware State Prison Cycle 2 and Cycle 3: 'J-Building houses a total of 100, with 50 in each side (J-1 and J-2), Tier 1 offenders, double bunked.' Macon State Prison Cycle 3: 'One building's unit houses 48 isolation beds and two safe cells and the other unit houses 48 double occupancy cells of segregation beds.' Dooly State Prison Cycle 4: 'Building J - Housing unit J2 is designated housing of Administrative Segregation, Isolation and Mental Health Observations. This housing unit will house 96 inmates in double bunks in a cell setting.' Wilcox State Prison, across three cycles: Cycle 1 'There are 22 isolation cells and 24 double bunked segregation cells'; Cycle 2 'There are 23 isolation cells and 72 double bunked segregation cells'; Cycle 3 'Number of segregation cells ...: 168.' Montgomery State Prison Cycle 2: 'an isolation/segregation unit with eight (8) isolation cells and eight (8) two-man segregation cells.' Johnson State Prison Cycle 3: 'J-1 and J-2 is an administrative segregation unit. J-1 houses 72 offenders. The top range of J-1 has 2 man cells and the lower range houses 2 ADA cells and 4 observation cells. J-2 has 46 2 man cells and 2 single man cells housing 94 offenders. Both units house offenders who are on voluntary or involuntary protective [custody].' Significance: double-bunked segregation and double-bunked Tier housing are not exceptional in Georgia; they are the ordinary described condition at most of the facilities that describe the condition at all. This is the facility-level counterpart to the policy finding that SOP 209.08 imposes no single-occupancy requirement for Tier II and SOP 209.06 treats single-celling in administrative segregation as an enumerated exception. It also shows the two occupancy modes running inside the same programme at the same prison: at Georgia State Prison, Tier II at G Building was double-bunked while Tier II at K Building was single-cell lockdown; at Hays, Tier I was two-man cells while Tier II was one-man cells.
solitary conditions facilities tier
Macon State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Macon State Prison had 121 Tier II total beds, 119 occupied, 2 vacant, 98.35% occupied.
121 beds vs. 119 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier II is long-term administrative segregation with no outer time limit Policy
SOP 209.08, 'Administrative Segregation - Tier II' (formerly IIB09-0003), effective 04/11/2016, Authority Bryson/Ward, Originating Division Facilities Division, Access Listing 'Level II: Required Inmate Library Access'. PowerDMS id 105951. Definition, Section III.B: 'Tier II Program: Long Term Administrative Segregation stratification plan that manages the institutional conduct and programmatic need of offenders assigned to the program.' Section IV.A.1: the offender 'is given the opportunity to progress through Phases 1, 2, and 3 of the program based upon his or her behavior and ability to adjust.' Section IV.A.3: 'Offenders who cannot return to general population because they pose a serious threat to the safety and security of the institutional operation shall remain in Phase 3. This may include, but is not limited to, offenders who have documented STG activities/involvement, notoriety of crimes, high level of supervision requirements, and offenders who have either been threatened with bodily harm or who have threatened others with bodily harm. These offenders shall be reviewed every 90 days to determine assignment status.' SOP 209.08 contains no maximum duration. Where Tier I is capped at 30 days and Tier III is capped at 24 months subject to exceptions, Tier II has no outer limit written into policy. A person who 'cannot return to general population' is retained in Phase 3 indefinitely, subject only to a 90-day review that may confirm retention. This is indefinite administrative segregation as a matter of written policy.
solitary policy legal
Named Tier forms and records identified in the SOP corpus Methodology note
SOP 209.07 (Tier I), Section V: Attachment 1 Tier I Program 96 Hour Segregation Hearing Report; Attachment 2 Tier I Program Offender Assignment to Segregation Memo; Attachment 3 Tier I Program Assignment Appeal Form; Attachment 4 Tier I Program Segregation/Isolation Checklist; Attachment 5 Tier I Program 30 Day Review Form; Attachment 6 Tier I Program 30 Day Review Appeal Form. Section VI.J requires 'Permanent logs ... maintained by the Correctional Officer on duty' recording 'all admissions and releases including: a. Date of action. b. Time of action. c. Reason for admission or release. d. Authorizing official or committee.' Section VI.K requires a daily-printed 'Accountability Log' with 'cell/room number, bed number, offender name, offender number, race, in or out time, assignment of offender and destination of offender.' SOP 209.08 (Tier II), Section V: Attachment 1 Tier II Program Assignment Recommendation; Attachment 1(a) Tier II Program Initial Segregation Review; Attachment 2 Tier II Program Assignment Memo; Attachment 3 Tier II Program Assignment Appeal Form; Attachment 4 Tier II Program Handout; Attachment 5 Tier II Program 90-Day Review; Attachment 6 Tier II Program Administrative Segregation 90-Day Review Memo; Attachment 7 Tier II Program 90-Day Review Assignment Appeal Form; Attachment 8 Tier II Program Cell Check Sheet; Attachment 9 Tier II Program Checklist; Attachment 10 Tier II Program Checklist - 30-Minute and 15-Minute Watch Form; Attachment 11 Tier II Program Performance Recording Sheet. Section IV.P.6 requires an 'Accountability Log ... accurate to the minute' including 'cell number, bed number, offender name, offender number, race, in or out time, assignment of offender and destination of offender.' SOP 209.09 (Tier III): Attachment 6 Tier III Program Privileges Chart; Attachment 10 Tier III Program Check List; Attachment 11 Offender's Management Plan; Attachment 12 the quarterly over-24-month panel review form; plus the 'Electronic Logbook (Note Active)' door sheet and unit log, which record per-individual out-of-cell and recreation times. Significance for records strategy: the per-cell, per-bed accountability logs required by both SOP 209.07 and SOP 209.08 are, by their own description, a daily record of who is housed in each Tier cell and bed. They are the facility-level record that would establish Tier population and occupancy mode. Note the obstacle: SOP 219.01, Section IV.E and IV.F assert that 'Offender records are confidential state secrets under O.C.G.A. § 42-5-36(c)' and direct that 'All requests for offender related records (SCRIBE, central and offender institutional files) shall be immediately forwarded to the GDC Office of Legal Services for review and processing.' A request framed around individual records will meet that exemption; a request framed around aggregate counts, unit rosters stripped of names, and the designation and capacity documents will not be answered by it.
solitary policy data_gap tier
The Special Management Unit was reported at 192 beds Statistic
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2017: 'GDCP also has a Special Management Unit that consists of 192 beds.' This matches the existing GPS datapoint recording an SMU design capacity of approximately 192 single-bunked cells, and GDC's own description of the SMU as consisting of six cellblocks containing single-bunked cells. Because SOP 209.09 requires all Tier III cells to be single occupancy, the SMU cell count and bed count coincide there — which is not true anywhere else in the Tier system.
192 beds in Special Management Unit
solitary facilities tier
Jacs quote: Tier is for major punishment Quote
"The tier is a special lockdown unit in several Georgia prisons. It's for major punishment."
solitary conditions tier
Verified GDC citation strings and doc_ids for principal Tier audits Methodology note
GDC's own citation strings and URLs for the audits carrying the Tier evidence in this collection, taken from the report index rather than constructed: Smith SP Cycles 1-4 (doc_ids 137, 160, 180, 341); Hays Cycles 1-2 (138, 149); Georgia SP Cycles 1-3 (135, 158, 336); Ware Cycles 2-3 (262, 308); Hancock Cycles 2-4 (269, 311, 364); Telfair Cycles 2 and 4 (156, 342); Valdosta SP Cycles 2 and 4 (154, 356); Macon Cycle 3 (315); GDCP Cycles 2-3 (148, 175); Phillips SP Cycle 2 (271); Dooly Cycle 4 (368); Johnson Cycle 3 (330); Wilcox Cycles 1-3 (257, 286, 332); Montgomery Cycle 2 (289); Lee Cycles 2-3 (281, 309); Autry Cycle 3 (316); Baldwin SP Cycle 4 (366); Coffee CF Cycle 4 (399); Wheeler CF Cycle 4 (398); Riverbend Cycle 4 (378). The cycle archive index pages are https://gdc.georgia.gov/prea-audit-reports-cycle-1-archived through https://gdc.georgia.gov/prea-audit-reports-cycle-4-archived.
solitary facilities tier
Clinical route out of restrictive housing generates per-person records Finding
There is a clinical route out of restrictive housing on health grounds, requiring a nurse's belief and a physician's concurrence. Every exercise of it generates a record. The restrictive-housing flow sheet is scanned into the electronic health record on removal, which means a per-person record of daily rounds in Tier housing exists in the health record system. Both are records leads, though the flow sheet is individual health information and would carry its own confidentiality barrier.
solitary conditions medical policy tier
SOP 209.07 Section II applies Tier I to all facility types system-wide Policy
SOP 209.07 Section II applies Tier I to 'All State Prisons, County CIs, Private Prisons, Intensive Treatment Facilities, Transitional Centers, Probation Detention Centers, and Probation Boot Camp housing GDC offenders or probationers.' So Tier I — short-term segregation with a five-hours-per-week out-of-cell floor — is authorised at every facility in the system. The Tier PROGRAMME designation tracks close security without exception; segregation CELLS exist throughout the system.
solitary policy tier facilities
SOP 209.08 sets no time limit on moderated-cell placement, conflicting with SOP 209.05's 8-hour cap Finding
SOP 209.05 imposes four controls — emergency use only, never as punishment, written Warden authorisation, an eight-hour initial maximum, and daily medical authorisation to continue. SOP 209.08 imports that policy only for the narrow question of bedding supplies, sets no time limit of its own on moderated-cell placement, and lists as a ground for it 'Continuous violations of policy, rules, & regulations while assigned to Tier II' — which is not an emergency and is punishment-shaped. The two policies are not reconciled. GPS should record the conflict rather than assume which governs.
solitary conditions medical policy legal tier
Documented unit sizes divide into single-bunk and double-bunk dorms, roughly a factor of two apart Finding
Derived from audit figures, stated as audit-reported capacities rather than counts of people present. Single-bunk Tier or segregation units: Hays Tier II F1, F2, G1, G2 at 32 each; Hays H1 and H2 at 47; Georgia State Prison K Building at 100 'single cell lockdown cells'; Telfair 40 single cells; Macon 48 isolation beds; Special Management Unit 192 single-bunked. Double-bunk Tier or segregation units: Hays D2 and E at 64 each; Hancock J at 20 cells double occupancy, later 38 inmates in combination single and double; Ware J-1 and J-2 at 50 each, 100 total; Telfair E-1 at 80 and E-2 at 70 in two-man cells, plus 40 double-bunked cells; Smith 48 double-bunked cells housing 96 per dorm; Georgia State Prison E-South 106 and G Building 218 in double bunk cells; Dooly J2 at 96 in double bunks; Macon 48 double occupancy cells; Montgomery 8 two-man cells; Lee 16 cells with 32 beds. The structural pattern: a unit of a given number of cells holds that number of people when single-bunked and twice that number when double-bunked. Smith is the clearest case — 48 cells per dorm holding 96 offenders. Hays shows the same arithmetic: Tier II one-man dorms at 32, Tier I two-man dorms at 64. Significance: whether a person in Georgia's Tier system is held alone or with a cellmate, and therefore whether a 23-hour-a-day confinement is solitary confinement within the Mandela Rules definition or not, is determined by which unit they are assigned to — and GDC's Tier II policy neither specifies nor reports it. The documented capacities run from 20 to 218 per unit; there is no standard Tier dorm size.
solitary conditions facilities tier
McRae Women's Facility Tier II beds Statistic
McRae Women's Facility had 34 Tier II total beds, 28 occupied, 6 vacant, 82.35% occupied.
34 beds vs. 28 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary demographics
Tier II's broadest admission criterion requires no adjudication Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.B, 'Criteria for Admission': 'Placement in the Tier II Program is the result of a Classification Committee decision that is approved by the Warden. To be eligible for placement in Tier II, an offender must have at least one of the following at the time of the request to assign the offender:' Criterion 1: 'The offender is noted as a threat to the safe and secure operation of the Facility. This may include, but is not limited to, offenders who have documented STG activities/involvement, notoriety of crimes, high level of supervision requirements, and offenders who have either been threatened with bodily harm or threatened others with bodily harm.' Criterion 5: 'Failure in the Tier I program or refusal to participate.' Criterion 10: 'Offenders with assaultive histories.' Criterion 11: 'Excessive destruction of state property.' Criterion 13: 'Attempting to introduce or trafficking of cellular devices, drugs, tobacco or other illegal contraband.' Criterion 1 is open-ended on its face — 'noted as a threat,' 'may include, but is not limited to,' no evidentiary standard, no requirement of a disciplinary conviction or hearing finding, and it expressly covers a person who 'ha[s] been threatened with bodily harm,' i.e. a victim rather than an aggressor. Criteria 1, 5, and 10 can each be satisfied without any disciplinary adjudication. This is the documented structural latitude in the placement rule; it is a statement about what the policy permits, not a finding about how it is used in any individual case.
solitary policy legal
GDC's restrictive-housing reporting language disappears from the annual reports after FY2020 Finding
A search of all eleven GDC Annual Fiscal Reports from FY2014 to FY2025 finds restrictive-housing and Tier programme narratives in FY2014, FY2017, FY2018, FY2019 and FY2020. From FY2021 onward the subject disappears as a programme narrative: the only matches in FY2023 are a staff-training roster line, and the only matches in FY2024 and FY2025 are 'Special Management Unit' appearing in a list of facilities receiving the NoteActive electronic logbook. GDC reported on reducing its restrictive-housing population in four consecutive reporting years and then stopped. The last year in which GDC published any figure about the size or trend of its restrictive-housing population was FY2019. There is no published figure, percentage or trend for the five reporting years FY2021 to FY2025.
solitary policy data_gap tier
Jacs quote: prison administrator uses Tier to get someone out of the way Quote
"The inmate may have committed violence against someone, killed someone in prison, or too often the prison administrator just uses it to get someone out of the way — hide them."
solitary conditions tier
Tier II staff inspection schedule excludes weekends and holidays for most roles Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.O.2, the Tier II staff inspection schedule: 'b. Health Care officials shall conduct an initial medical round or visit within the first 24 hours after placement in Tier II and then three times per week excluding weekends and holidays. ... e. The Chief of Security shall conduct visits daily, excluding weekends and holidays. f. The Unit Manager shall conduct visits daily, excluding weekends and holidays. g. The Institutional Duty Officer shall conduct visits daily. h. The Deputy Warden shall conduct visits daily, excluding weekends and holidays. i. The Warden shall conduct visits at a minimum of twice per week.'
solitary conditions policy staffing tier
GDC's public Tier fact sheet lists only men's prisons, but McRae Women's Facility runs a 34-bed Tier II unit Finding
GDC's public Tier Segregation System fact sheet names seven Tier facilities, all men's prisons: Hancock, Hays, Macon, Smith, Telfair, Valdosta and Ware. The current version, which GDC produced on 2026-10-05 in open-records request R031710-091426, still names only those seven. GDC's own bed table, produced three days earlier in the same request, lists an eighth Tier II location: McRae Women's Facility, 34 Tier II beds with 28 occupied. So the Tier II programme does operate in a women's prison, and GDC's public description of the system leaves it out. The bed table carries no as-of date (GDC created the PDF on 2026-10-02). The Tier SOPs are written in gender-neutral terms and SOP 209.07 applies Tier I system-wide.
solitary facilities demographics policy tier
Stripped-cell placements generate countable records: Warden authorization and daily medical sign-off Methodology note
Because SOP 209.05 requires written Warden authorisation and daily medical authorisation to continue a stripped-cell placement, each such placement generates a dated written record and a daily medical sign-off. Those are countable, and they are the records that would show how often and for how long moderated and stripped cells are used inside Tier II.
solitary conditions medical policy tier operations
Per-facility segregation cell counts as GDC's audits report them Finding
Segregation cell counts as stated in each facility's audit, with the cycle from which the figure is taken. Cycle 2 audits report this in a structured Pre-Audit Questionnaire 'Physical Plant' block headed 'Number of Segregation Cells (Administrative and Disciplinary)'; cycles 3 and 4 use variant labels; cycles 1, 4 and 5 are often narrative only. Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison 409 (Cycle 2); Smith State Prison 336 (Cycle 2); Telfair State Prison 280 (Cycle 2); Hays State Prison 252 (Cycle 2); Hancock State Prison 223 (Cycle 4, and 223 again in Cycle 3); Calhoun State Prison 197 (Cycle 2); Macon State Prison 192 (Cycle 2); Coffee Correctional Facility, private, 170 (Cycle 4); Wilcox State Prison 168 (Cycle 3); Baldwin State Prison 167 (Cycle 2); Valdosta State Prison 161 (Cycle 2); Ware State Prison 125 (Cycle 2); Phillips State Prison 100 (Cycle 3, reported as 'a total of 100 isolation/segregation cells'; 75 in Cycle 2); Autry State Prison 95 (Cycle 2); Rogers State Prison 95 (Cycle 2); Coastal State Prison 74 (Cycle 2); Dooly State Prison 71 (Cycle 3); Dodge State Prison 50 (Cycle 2); Wheeler Correctional Facility, private, 49 (Cycle 4); Washington State Prison 48 (Cycle 3); Rutledge State Prison 32 (Cycle 3); Pulaski State Prison 30 (Cycle 4, 'up to 30 isolation/segregation cells for up to 43 offenders'); Montgomery State Prison 16 (Cycle 3); Lee State Prison 16 cells with 32 beds (Cycle 3); Georgia State Prison 12 (Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire — see the data-integrity note below); Burruss Correctional Training Center 10 (Cycle 2); Emanuel Women's Facility 7 (Cycle 3); Whitworth Women's Facility 7 (Cycle 4); West Central Integrated Treatment Facility 5 (Cycle 4); Long Unit 4 (Cycle 2). Also stated in narrative form: Riverbend Correctional Facility, private, 'one lockdown unit with 50 segregation beds and 25 isolation beds' (Cycle 4); Autry State Prison Cycle 3, 'a segregation unit with 86 beds and 47 beds for isolation and protective custody'; Baldwin State Prison Cycle 4, K1 housing 33 inmates, K2 34, K3 50; Central State Prison Cycle 2, '24 Isoltion/Segregation beds' as printed; Metro Reentry Facility Cycle 4, 'the facility head reported having zero administrative segregation beds.'
solitary facilities conditions demographics tier
Smith State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Smith State Prison had 111 Tier II total beds, 89 occupied, 22 vacant, 80.18% occupied.
111 beds vs. 89 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier II admits prisoners at mental health Level III; Tier III does not Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.B, criterion 10, Note: 'This only applies to offenders in GP status and offenders who are MH Level II. MH Level III must be screened and recommended by MH staff before consideration for placement in the Tier II Program. No MH Level IV offenders are eligible for consideration to the Tier II Program.' SOP 209.09, Section IV.B, Note: 'The criteria listed above for admission to Tier III only apply to offenders whose mental health level is classified as MH Level II or less. MH Level III/IV offenders who meet the criteria above shall be screened by MH Staff and considered for placement in a Specialized Mental Health Treatment Units (SMHTU). Refer to SOP 508.23, SMHTU.' Tier III excludes both MH Level III and Level IV. Tier II excludes only Level IV and admits Level III on mental-health recommendation. The effect written into policy is that prisoners with the higher mental-health classifications are routed away from Tier III — the unit whose conditions were reformed under litigation and which guarantees four hours out of cell — and remain eligible for Tier II, whose policy floor is five hours per week. Existing GPS datapoint 6614 records that over 70 percent of roughly 300 people in Georgia State Prison's Tier II program experienced serious mental illness.
solitary mental_health policy
The Tier III Special Management Unit population IS published, because the SMU is carried as a facility — 154 people as of 2026-09-01 Statistic
GDC Profile of All Inmates, August 2026: The Special Management Unit at Jackson appears as a facility row in the monthly Inmate Statistical Profile series' facility population table. As of 2026-09-01 it held 154 people. Across 75 monthly snapshots from 2020-07-01 to 2026-09-01 the SMU population ranged from 149 to 195. GDC does publish a Tier III population, but only as a side effect of the SMU being a standalone facility with its own GDC facility code. It is one facility at Jackson. It is not the statewide Tier population and it says nothing about Tier I or Tier II, whose units sit inside ordinary prisons and are therefore absorbed invisibly into those prisons' facility totals. Against the SMU's 192 beds, a population of 154 implies the unit has run below its bed capacity throughout the published series.
154 people held in Special Management Unit (Tier III)
solitary facilities demographics tier
SOP 227.02 prohibits retaliation for grievances but makes segregation assignment non-grievable Finding
SOP 227.02, 'Statewide Grievance Procedure,' effective 2019-05-10, PowerDMS id 105711. Section IV.A.3: 'Retaliation against an Offender for filing a grievance is strictly prohibited. The prohibited retaliation includes, but is not limited to, disciplinary action against the Offender for filing a grievance.' Section IV.B.3: 'An Offender may file a grievance alleging retaliation or harassment, regardless of the form of the alleged retaliation or harassment.' But the same SOP removes the alleged act from the grievance system: Section IV.B.2.d, non-grievable: 'Involuntary assignments to Administrative Segregation: The procedure to appeal such assignment is located in SOP 209.06, Administrative Segregation.' Section IV.B.2.g, non-grievable: 'Housing assignments, program assignments, security classifications or work assignments, unless there is an alleged threat to the Offender's health or safety.' A person moved into administrative segregation after filing a grievance may file a grievance alleging retaliation in the abstract, but may not grieve the segregation assignment itself unless able to frame a threat to health or safety. The remedy is routed into the SOP 209.06 classification appeal, which tests whether the placement criteria are met and does not test motive, and which SOP 209.06 Section IV.F.5 terminates with the Warden, whose 'review and decision on the appeal is final.'
solitary legal policy tier
Tier I staff inspection schedule excludes weekends and holidays for most roles Policy
SOP 209.07, Section VI.F, imposes the equivalent schedule for Tier I: health care three times a week 'excluding weekends and holidays'; Chief of Security and Unit Manager daily 'excluding weekends and holidays'; Deputy Warden 'at least once each day, excluding weekends/holidays'; Warden 'at least twice per week'; Institutional Duty Officer daily.
solitary conditions policy staffing tier
Data gap: whether GDC operates Tier II for women is unanswered Data gap
Whether GDC operates a Tier II programme for women, and if not, what long-term segregation mechanism applies to women, is not answered anywhere in the SOP corpus or in the published fact sheets GPS holds. The record that would answer it is the current facility designation document, which is the same missing document identified in Part 1.
solitary facilities demographics data_gap tier
Mental health staff must evaluate conduct leading to stripped cell before security intervention Policy
SOP 209.05, Section IV.B.1: at facilities with mental health staff, 'The MH/MR team is responsible for evaluating the unauthorized actions of an inmate/probationer prior to or in support of security intervention. Upon notification, MH/MR will make the determination if such activity is MH/MR precipitated. If this is the case, MH/MR will assume responsibility for managing the situation.'
solitary mental_health conditions policy tier
System-wide segregation total is at least 3,401 cells, and that is a floor Statistic
Summing the most recent audit per facility that states a count gives 3,401 segregation cells across 30 facilities; restricting to state-operated facilities gives 3,182 across 28. On a single-cycle basis, the 23 state facilities with a structured Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire figure total 2,967, rising to 3,078 across 25 when Wilcox (23 isolation plus 72 double-bunked segregation) and Montgomery (8 isolation plus 8 two-man segregation) are added from narrative. Four caveats: (1) This is a CELL count, not a bed count and not a population count. The audits themselves are explicit that these are different quantities and that many of these cells hold two people — Lee State Prison states '16 cells with 32 beds'; Wilcox '72 double bunked segregation cells'; Montgomery 'eight (8) two-man segregation cells'; Macon '48 double occupancy cells.' The bed count is materially higher than 3,401 and the number of people is a separate unknown. GPS has not interpolated either and should not. (2) It is a floor, not a total. At least six state facilities with published audits contribute zero because no audit of them ever states a figure: Arrendale State Prison (three audits), Augusta State Medical Prison (four audits), Walker State Prison (five audits), Helms Facility, Emanuel Unit, and McRae Women's Facility (no audit in the corpus under that name). (3) It mixes vintages. The figures span Cycle 2 (2017 to 2019), Cycle 3 (2019 to 2021) and Cycle 4 (2021 to 2025). The most recent audits of five of the nine Tier prisons — Georgia Diagnostic and Classification, Hays, Smith, Macon and Wilcox — dropped the segregation-cell field, so those facilities contribute older numbers. (4) It counts all segregation, not only Tier programme housing. Tier units are a subset. Comparison, flagged as a comparison of unlike measures: GDC's FY2014 Annual Fiscal Report states that 2,721 beds were converted to Tier beds at all Level V facilities. The PREA-derived figure of 3,401 is a cell count of all segregation across all facility types and a decade later. The two are not the same measure and must not be presented as a trend.
3,401 segregation cells vs. 2,721 FY2014 Tier beds converted at Level V facilities (different measure)
solitary facilities demographics conditions tier
Telfair State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Telfair State Prison had 117 Tier II total beds, 117 occupied, 0 vacant, 100.00% occupied.
117 beds vs. 117 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier II documents a mental-health variant and an SMU-to-Tier-II pipeline Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.B, criterion 12: 'Transfer from GDCP SMU to a Tier II-Phase 3 or Tier II-Mental Health program.' GDC's own criteria list establishes (a) that a 'Tier II-Mental Health' program exists as a distinct placement, and (b) that the Special Management Unit at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison discharges people into Tier II Phase 3 rather than to general population.
solitary mental_health policy
SMU admissions and releases are also published, and are very small Statistic
The Special Management Unit appears as a single state-prison facility row in each of the 22 GDC Profile of Inmate Admissions and 22 Profile of Inmate Releases editions. In FY2025 the SMU recorded 5 admissions, 0.06 percent of state-prison admissions. The admissions figure counts people admitted to GDC custody directly at the SMU, not transfers into the Tier III programme from other prisons, which is how most people reach it. It should not be read as a Tier III intake figure. It does document that a small number of people are placed in the Special Management Unit immediately on entering GDC custody, which corresponds to SOP 209.09's retention criterion for offenders 'whose crimes are so egregious that the offender was placed in the Tier III Program immediately upon being placed in GDC custody.'
5 admissions to SMU in FY2025 vs. 0.1 percent of state-prison admissions
solitary demographics facilities tier
Grievances excluded from SCRIBE file that drives Tier II release decision Finding
SOP 227.02, Section IV.E.2.b: 'A Grievance must not be placed in the Offender's file or referred to in SCRIBE case notes.' SOP 209.08, Section IV.F.5.c.1 conditions release from Tier II on the Unit Manager's review in SCRIBE of the offender's disciplinary reports, profiles, alternative entrée meal profiles, case notes, Security Threat Group history, incident reports, progress notes, movement history, mental health status, personal history sheet, medical profile, court production orders, and county of conviction and residence. A keyword search of SOP 209.08 for 'grievance' returns nothing: the Tier II policy does not mention grievances at all and contains no anti-retaliation provision. The one record that would show a grievance preceded a Tier placement is, by GDC policy, absent from both the institutional file and the SCRIBE case notes — and SCRIBE case notes are among the records that determine whether a person leaves Tier II.
solitary legal policy tier
Only Institutional Duty Officer required on weekends and holidays in Tier units Finding
Of the officials required to inspect Tier housing and to 'observe and evaluate conditions of confinement and speak with offenders,' only the Institutional Duty Officer is required to attend on weekends and holidays. Health care, the Chief of Security, the Unit Manager and the Deputy Warden are all expressly excused. Read together with the exercise entitlement — five hours per week across five days in Tier I, with no daily distribution specified at all in Tier II — GDC's own Tier policies describe a unit that operates on a reduced schedule on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, with no guaranteed out-of-cell time and no required visit from any of the four supervisory or clinical roles.
solitary conditions policy staffing tier
Seven-facility Tier designation rests on 2018-2019 fact sheets and may be stale Data gap
The seven-facility Tier I and II designation derives from GDC fact sheets of which GPS holds the 2018 and 2019 editions, archived at the Digital Library of Georgia, together with the undated GDC Close Security Facility Fact Sheet. Material changes have occurred since: Georgia State Prison at Reidsville, which the Southern Center for Human Rights' 2021 complaint identified as running a Tier II programme of approximately 300 people, closed on 2022-02-19; SOP 209.09 was revised effective 2025-04-23 and again effective 2026-06-18; and SOP 508.01, effective 2023, refers to 'designated SMHTU/TIER II facilities' without naming them. The seven-facility list should therefore be cited as GDC's designation as of 2018-2019, not as the current set.
solitary facilities policy data_gap tier
Facilities without mental health staff must consult nearest GDC facility with MH/MR staff Policy
SOP 209.05, Section IV.B.2: at facilities without mental health staff, 'the senior medical employee is responsible for evaluating the unauthorized actions ... They will determine by telephonic contact with the nearest GDC facility/center which has an MH/MR staff, if such activity may be MH/MR precipitated, and if this is substantiated the inmate/probationer will be transferred to an appropriate facility/center for full MH/MR evaluation.'
solitary mental_health conditions policy tier transfers
Segregation capacity does not track close security, even though the Tier designation does Finding
The Tier programme designation appears only at close-security prisons, without exception. But segregation and administrative-segregation housing is documented at medium-security prisons throughout the system, sometimes at a larger scale than at close-security prisons: Calhoun State Prison, whose Cycle 2 audit gives its security level as '4/Medium', reports 197 segregation cells — more than close-security Baldwin (167), Ware (125) or Phillips (75). Wilcox State Prison, described in its own audits as 'housing medium security, general population inmates,' reports 168 segregation cells in Cycle 3, up from 24 double-bunked in Cycle 1 and 72 in Cycle 2. Coffee Correctional Facility, a private medium-security prison, reports 170. Rogers State Prison ('Minimum/Medium') reports 95; Autry State Prison reports 95, and its Cycle 3 audit describes 'a segregation unit with 86 beds and 47 beds for isolation and protective custody.' Dooly State Prison, medium security, reports 71 cells in Cycle 3, and its Cycle 4 audit describes housing unit J2 as 'designated housing of Administrative Segregation, Isolation and Mental Health Observations ... 96 inmates in double bunks in a cell setting.' Also documented at medium-security facilities: Washington 48; Johnson, whose J-1 and J-2 are 'an administrative segregation unit' holding 72 and 94 offenders; Dodge 50, with Cycle 4 describing 'Pod A4 is a segregation unit used to house disciplinary and protective custody inmates'; Coastal 74, with Cycle 4 describing 'H Building ... the closed, isolation/segregation unit'; Rutledge 32, with Cycle 4 describing 'Housing Unit G ... the administrative segregation unit'; Montgomery 16; Lee 16 cells and 32 beds; Central '24 Isoltion/Segregation beds'; Whitworth Women's Facility 7; Burruss Correctional Training Center 10; Long Unit 4. Significance: the Tier label marks where GDC concentrates long-term administrative segregation programming. It does not mark where segregation cells exist. Every state prison in the corpus that reports a number reports segregation cells, close security or medium. Any account of Georgia's use of isolation that follows only the Tier designation will miss the majority of the facilities that operate segregation housing, including a medium-security prison with a 96-person double-bunked administrative segregation unit.
solitary facilities conditions demographics tier
Valdosta State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Valdosta State Prison had 129 Tier II total beds, 80 occupied, 49 vacant, 62.02% occupied.
129 beds vs. 80 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier II placement is decided by facility staff; release is decided at Central Office Policy
SOP 209.08, Section III.A: the Tier II Classification Committee 'will consist of the Administrative Segregation: Tier II Program Unit Manager, Administrative Segregation: Tier II Program OIC, assigned counselor and as applicable, the assigned Mental Health counselor.' Section IV.C.4: 'The Warden/Designee will review for approval/disapproval all Classification Committee recommendations for assignment to the Tier II Program. The process for approval or denial of the request must be completed within seven (7) business days.' Section IV.C.3: 'the Classification Committee will hold an Administrative Segregation Hearing within 96-hours in accordance with SOP 209.06.' Section IV.C.7: 'In emergency situations, the Warden/Designee may authorize the immediate assignment of an offender to the Tier II Program.' Section IV.C.6: initial placement appeal goes 'to the Director of Field Operations or his/her Designee within three (3) business days,' reviewed 'within fourteen (14) business days.' Release, Section IV.F.5.c: the exit chain runs Tier II Unit Manager recommendation -> Warden and Regional Director review -> 'the Criminal Investigations Unit STG Coordinator shall investigate the offender for any documented Security Threat Group Activities' (completed 'within 10 (ten) business days') -> Regional Director advises Warden -> 'forwarded, electronically, to the Director of Field Operations who will make the final decision' -> 'The Tier Segregation Manager shall review the offender's record in SCRIBE ... and determine the appropriate placement.' A facility can put a person into Tier II on its own authority, including immediately in an emergency, but it cannot take a person out. Release requires a statewide Criminal Investigations Unit clearance and the personal decision of the Director of Field Operations. The asymmetry is written into the policy.
solitary policy legal
GDC publishes no count of the people held in Tier segregation anywhere in the corpus GPS holds Data gap
A systematic review of the GDC-published report corpus GPS holds found no published count of the Tier or restrictive-housing population. The review covered 110 non-monthly GDC reports and all 34 distribution sections of the monthly Inmate Statistical Profile series: Annual Fiscal Reports, all eleven years FY2014 to FY2025: restrictive-housing language in five years, a reduction percentage and a delta in two, never a population. Daily Population by Facility / Average Daily Population, all 22 editions: the report consists of eleven facility-TYPE rows and three columns (Capacity, On Hand, Utilization). The FY2025 edition reports State Prisons 37,638 capacity / 35,369 on hand / 94.0 percent utilization, and equivalent lines for Pre Release Centers, County Prisons, Transitional Centers, Inmate Boot Camps, Private Prisons, Diversion Centers, Detention Centers, Probation Boot Camps, Parole Revocation Centers and RSAT Centers. There is no housing type, no security level, no segregation status and no individual facility. All 22 editions are structurally identical. Note also that every 'capacity' in this series is GDC's OPERATIONAL capacity, never design capacity. Monthly Inmate Statistical Profiles: the series publishes 34 distributions — actual_release_type, admission_type, age_10yr, age_admission, circuit_conviction, county_conviction, dependents, disciplinary, education, employment, escapes, hepc, hiv, home_county, institution_type, marital, mental_health, military, offense_category, offense_detail, offense_fel_misd, prior_incarcerations, pulhes_p, pulhes_s, race, release_type, religion, sentence_years, supervision, syphilis, tb, time_in_institution, transfers, years_served. None reports segregation, restrictive housing or Tier status. The four near-misses fail specifically: 'supervision' offers only Close, Medium and Minimum; 'institution_type' offers only County CI, County Jail, Private Prison, Probation Detention Center, RSAT Center, State Prison and Transitional Center; 'disciplinary' reports counts of disciplinary reports, not sanctions or placements; 'mental_health' reports care levels. PREA Annual Reports, all eleven editions 2014 to 2024: report allegation and substantiation counts by facility and physical-plant improvements. The SMU appears only as a facility row in allegation tables. No segregation population is reported, despite PREA's provisions on segregating vulnerable and at-risk prisoners. Admissions profiles (22), Releases profiles (22), Inmate Services Impact reports (9), Release by County, Three-Year Reconviction, Cost Per Day, Year-End Population since 1925, Length of Stay, the Friday report, Truth in Sentencing, executions and detainers: no Tier or segregation population in any of them. GPS's own open-records archive: the phrase 'restrictive housing' is absent from all 22 GDC productions, and 'Tier II' is absent from all 261 productions in the archive. GPS's file store contains no file named for Tier or segregation.
solitary demographics policy data_gap tier
Gumm v. Ford case identity and procedural history Legal fact
Gumm v. Ford, later captioned Gumm v. Jacobs and Daughtry v. Emmons as defendants changed: No. 5:15-cv-00041-MTT-CHW, United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia, before Chief Judge Marc T. Treadwell. Nature of suit 'Prisoner: Prison Condition,' cause '42:1983 Prisoner Civil Rights.' Filed 2015-02-12 as a handwritten pro se complaint by Timothy Gumm; terminated 2019-05-07. Sarah Geraghty of the Southern Center for Human Rights was appointed counsel 2016-10-17; Kilpatrick Townsend and Stockton joined as co-class counsel. Sourcing caveat: the RECAP docket entries are unnumbered minute entries without free text, so the operative documents are not readable through CourtListener. The findings recorded here rest on the GPS research library's captures of the primary documents — the April 19, 2024 order and the May 8, 2019 decision — not on verbatim text re-verified in this pass.
solitary legal tier
Tier I exercise entitlement: five hours per week across five days Policy
Tier I provides an exercise entitlement of five hours per week across five days. Tier II has no daily distribution specified at all.
solitary conditions policy tier
Georgia State Prison ran Tier II programme of approximately 300 people before 2022 closure Statistic
The Southern Center for Human Rights' September 2021 class action complaint concerning Georgia State Prison alleged approximately 300 people in that prison's Tier II programme, over 70 percent of them experiencing serious mental illness. Georgia State Prison at Reidsville closed 2022-02-19. Status: an allegation in a complaint, not a finding, and describing a facility that has since closed. Its value is as the only facility-level Tier II population figure in any source GPS holds, and as an order-of-magnitude indication: one prison's Tier II programme held roughly 300 people, against a Special Management Unit that has held 149 to 195 people across the whole published monthly series.
300 people in Tier II programme at Georgia State Prison vs. 70 percent experiencing serious mental illness
solitary facilities mental_health demographics tier
MH/MR-precipitated actions trigger SOP VG67-0001 Time Out, Seclusion and Physical Restraints Policy
SOP 209.05, Section IV.B.3: 'If the inmate's/probationer's actions resulting in stripped cell placement are of an MH/MR nature, then proper procedures will be initiated in accordance with SOP VG67-0001, "Time Out, Seclusion and Physical Restraints".'
solitary mental_health conditions policy tier
Data-integrity defects in GDC's published PREA audits bearing on segregation counts Methodology note
Recorded because these defects affect any figure derived from the PREA corpus, and because they are defects in GDC's own published record. (1) Georgia State Prison's 'Cycle 3' audit is the Cycle 2 audit republished. The document at .../prea-georgia-state-prison-audit-cycle-3/download and the document at .../prea-georgia-sp-audit-cycle-2/download are both 181 pages and their extracted text is identical after whitespace normalisation — 546,523 characters, zero differences. Both carry a final report date of 2019-03-22 and October 2018 onsite dates. There is no distinct Cycle 3 PREA audit of Georgia State Prison published, and its segregation figure must not be counted twice. (2) Emanuel Women's Facility's Cycle 5 audit is published twice, at .../prea-emanuel-wf-audit-cycle-5/download and .../prea-emanuel-wf-audit-cycle-5-0/download, identical, 151 pages each. (3) Telfair State Prison's Cycle 4 audit contradicts itself internally: 'The PCM indicated the facility does not have administrative segregation cells,' and, in the same report's interviews section, 'Through the interview process the facility head reported having 360 administrative segregation beds.' Telfair's Cycle 2 audit reported 280 segregation cells and called the prison 'a Tier I and Tier II Facility.' All three figures are irreconcilable from the documents. (4) The same 'does not have administrative segregation cells' form response appears in Cycle 4 and 5 audits of prisons whose own earlier audits reported substantial segregation capacity: Rogers State Prison Cycle 4 against Rogers Cycle 2's 95, and Montgomery State Prison Cycle 5 against Montgomery's 8 plus 8 in Cycle 2 and 16 in Cycle 3. (5) Pre-Audit Questionnaire segregation fields contradict the same audit's own physical description in at least three cases. Georgia State Prison Cycle 2's questionnaire says 12 segregation cells while its narrative itemises 106 Tier I cells at E-South, 218 Tier II beds at G Building and 100 Tier II single lockdown cells at K Building. Telfair Cycle 2's questionnaire says 280 while its narrative describes an isolation and segregation unit of '40 single cells and 40 double-bunked cells.' Hancock Cycle 2's questionnaire says 320 while its narrative says 'J Building - Tier 1/Segregation ... There are 20 cells in the unit.' (6) Georgia State Prison Cycle 2's security-level field reads 'Minimum' while the same report's narrative states 'This facility is a close security institution' and gives the population as '379 Close Security, 768 Medium, 087 Minimum.' (7) Coastal State Prison's Cycle 1 audit says 'a 74-bed segregation unit' while its Cycle 2 questionnaire gives 74 segregation CELLS — the same number one cycle apart with a different unit of measure. (8) Label defects leave the unit of measure undetermined: Washington Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation units 48' where 48 is implausible as housing units at a prison the same table credits with 13; Dooly Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation 71' with the noun missing entirely; Pulaski Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation units 1,' which is not comparable to a cell count and is excluded from totals. (9) Augusta State Medical Prison Cycle 1's '50 Tier II Mental Health beds' is ambiguous: in GDC usage 'Level II' is also a mental-health classification, and Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 uses '49 Tier II Mental Health Offenders' for what reads as a mental-health designation. Augusta State Medical Prison is therefore NOT counted as a Tier-housing facility here. (10) Cycle 1 audits are two-to-four-page auditor summaries with no Physical Plant table, so most contribute nothing quantitative even for prisons that later report hundreds of cells. Consequence for GPS: the PREA corpus is the best per-facility segregation dataset GDC publishes, and it is internally inconsistent. Any published GPS figure drawn from it must name the facility, the cycle and the field, and must not silently reconcile a questionnaire figure against a narrative one.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Ware State Prison Tier II beds Statistic
Ware State Prison had 138 Tier II total beds, 138 occupied, 0 vacant, 100.00% occupied.
138 beds vs. 138 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
GDC employs a statewide 'Tier Segregation Manager' Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.F.5.c.5 and c.6 name a 'Tier Segregation Manager' who is advised electronically of the Director of Field Operations' release decision and who 'shall review the offender's record in SCRIBE, following the criteria in 5.1.a-m, and determine the appropriate placement of the offender.' Section IV.F.5.c.3 likewise requires the STG Coordinator to advise 'the Regional Director and the Tier Segregation Manager.' GDC maintains a single statewide position whose function is to place individuals within the Tier system. That position necessarily holds or can produce a statewide view of Tier placements. This is the strongest documentary indication in the SOP corpus that a centralized Tier population record exists.
solitary policy
A structural reason the Tier population cannot be recovered from what GDC publishes Finding
SOP 209.09, Section IV.A.2: 'All offenders assigned to the Tier III Program are classified as Close Security.' SOP 209.45 and SOP 209.55 classify Tier II STEP and Tier III STEP offenders as Close Security. The monthly Inmate Statistical Profile's only housing-adjacent field is 'supervision,' which reports Close, Medium and Minimum. The Tier population is contained within GDC's published Close Security count but cannot be isolated from it, because GDC publishes security classification and not housing status. The existing GPS datapoint recording 11,600-plus people in close security therefore includes the Tier population without identifying it. The published data structure makes the Tier population arithmetically unrecoverable rather than merely unpublished.
solitary demographics facilities policy tier
2024 contempt order found GDC had no intention of complying with settlement Legal fact
Document 484, April 19, 2024: Chief Judge Treadwell found that GDC had 'no desire or intention' to comply with the December 2018 settlement, and ordered an independent monitor, fines of $2,500 per day (amounting to $75,000 every 30 days for six months), and additional attorney's fees, thereby extending the settlement past its initial three-year term. The order also documents that officials falsified therapy records, including recording that a man attended treatment sessions after he was already dead.
solitary legal corruption tier
Documentation of rounds is color-coded by role in Tier units Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.O.3: 'Documentation of rounds: It shall be the responsibility of each individual to document in the appropriate colored ink so as to provide a clear record of who has visited the segregation unit. Wardens and Supervisors shall document in red ink. Health Care staff shall document in green ink. Counselors shall document in blue ink and Officers shall document in black ink. This documentation is for the sign in log and all the Tier II Program flow sheets.' SOP 209.07, Section VI.F.9 imposes the identical colour scheme for Tier I.
solitary conditions policy tier
Derived comparison: one Tier II programme was roughly twice the size of entire Tier III SMU Finding
Derived comparison, flagged as derived: if a single Tier II programme held approximately 300 people while the entire Tier III Special Management Unit holds around 154, then Tier II at one facility was roughly twice the size of the whole Tier III programme. GPS cannot extrapolate from one facility to a system total, and must not. The comparison is offered only to show why a system-wide Tier II count matters more than the SMU figure GDC does publish.
solitary facilities tier data_gap
GDC policy recognizes stripped-cell behaviors are frequently psychiatric in origin Finding
GDC policy recognises that the behaviours which lead to a stripped cell — flooding a cell, smearing or throwing bodily fluids, refusing to be cuffed, setting fires, self-injury — are frequently psychiatric in origin, and requires a clinical determination before or alongside the security response. Read against SOP 209.08, which admits mental health Level III prisoners to Tier II and lists those same behaviours as grounds for moderated-cell placement, this creates a documented decision point at which clinical judgment is supposed to displace a punitive response.
solitary mental_health conditions policy tier
Methodology caution: 'tier' in PREA audits usually means architectural gallery, not Tier programme Methodology note
The word 'tier' in a PREA audit usually means the upper or lower gallery of a cellblock, not the Tier programme. Phrases such as 'two tiers of two-man cells' (Hancock Cycle 4), 'four two-tiered cellblocks' (Georgia State Prison), 'an upper and lower tier' (Telfair, Smith) and 'This is a 2 Tier dorm that houses 30 inmates on the top tier and twenty-eight (28) on the bottom tier' (Pulaski Cycles 2 and 3) are architectural and are excluded throughout.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Special Management Unit Tier III beds Statistic
The Special Management Unit had 160 Tier III total beds, 128 occupied, 32 vacant, 80.00% occupied.
160 beds vs. 128 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
The Tier II 90-day review appeal is decided by the official who approved the placement Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.C.6: the appeal of INITIAL assignment goes to the Director of Field Operations (14 business days). SOP 209.08, Section IV.F.4 and IV.F.4.a: the appeal of the 90-day review — the decision that CONTINUES confinement — goes only to the Warden: the offender may 'submit written objections (via attachment 7) to the Warden within three (3) business days,' and 'The Warden/Designee shall complete a review of the offender's appeal of the Classification Committee's recommendation. This review must be completed within seven (7) business days.' Under Section IV.C.4 the Warden/Designee is the official who approves Tier II placement in the first instance. Under Section IV.F.4 the same Warden/Designee decides the appeal against continued placement. Every subsequent 90-day decision to keep a person in indefinite administrative segregation is therefore reviewed only by the official who authorised the confinement, with no route to Central Office — unlike the initial placement, which does have such a route.
solitary policy legal
No GDC policy requires a Tier population count to be compiled Finding
A review of the 209 series found no SOP naming any Tier roster, periodic report, or Central Office aggregate submission. The term 'Central Office' does not appear in SOP 209.08 at all. The Statewide Classification Committee exists in SOP 220.09 only for transgender and intersex housing decisions and has no Tier function. Instead, Tier placements flow upward as individual approvals: for Tier II, Classification Committee to Warden, with notice to the Regional Director, and release requiring the Director of Field Operations; for Tier III, under SOP 209.09 effective 6/18/2026, facility Warden to Tier III Program Classification Committee to SMU Warden to North Regional Director, with an appeal to the Deputy Director, Field Operations and a final decision by the Director, Field Operations, and with retention past 24 months requiring the personal approval of the Director, Field Operations or the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities. The reason no Tier population figure is published is not that the data does not exist — GDC's own annual reports say a SCRIBE module tracks it — but that no policy instrument requires anyone to compile it into a report. Every approval travels as a single case. This is the mechanism of the invisibility, and it is documented from GDC's own rules.
solitary policy data_gap tier
Figure discrepancy: attorney's fees in Gumm v. Ford vs. DOAS Risk Management payment Methodology note
The litigation record states $425,000 in attorney's fees and costs, while the Georgia Department of Administrative Services Risk Management dataset obtained by GPS open-records request 2026-OPN-00310 records 'Gumm, Timothy Denver — $464,500, incident year 2010.' These are different figures and probably different things; the DOAS figure may include damages or later fee awards. They must not be merged or used interchangeably until reconciled.
legal budget tier
Color-coded sign-in logs are self-auditing records Finding
The sign-in logs and flow sheets are, by design, self-auditing as to which category of official attended and when. That makes them unusually probative records for testing whether the inspection schedule was kept, and they are named in both SOPs.
solitary conditions policy tier
Georgia State Prison closed 2022-02-19 Case detail
Georgia State Prison at Reidsville closed on 2022-02-19. The Southern Center for Human Rights' 2021 complaint identified it as running a Tier II programme of approximately 300 people.
facilities operations tier
Whether mental health determination is made and recorded in practice is unknown Data gap
Whether the clinical determination required by SOP 209.05 is made and recorded in practice is unknown; the record that would show it is the mental-health evaluation documentation required by SOP 209.05 for each stripped-cell placement.
solitary mental_health conditions policy tier operations
Methodology caution: boilerplate 'Tier Program' PREA education sentence inflates facility lists Methodology note
A single sentence of GDC policy boilerplate about delayed PREA education — 'In the case of exigent circumstances, the training may be delayed, but no more than 30 days, until such time is appropriate for delivery (i.e. Tier Program, medical issues etc.)' — appears in roughly 60 audits, including audits of transitional centres, probation detention centres and county correctional institutions that demonstrably have no Tier housing. It is a quotation of agency policy, not a finding about the audited facility, and it is excluded throughout. A naive keyword search for 'Tier Program' across the PREA corpus produces a badly inflated facility list for this reason.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison STEP beds Statistic
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison had 20 STEP total beds, 3 occupied, 17 vacant, 15.00% occupied.
20 beds vs. 3 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Exit from Tier II is conditioned on completing a program, and routes back through Tier I Policy
SOP 209.08, Section III.D defines the program: 'Offenders under Transition (O.U.T.) Program: Cognitive Behavioral Program utilized in the Tier II facilities designed to enhance an offenders' motivation to change problem behaviors, criminal thinking, and provide pro-social skills.' Section IV.F.5.a: 'The offender must be actively participating in the O.U.T. Program (Offenders Under Transition). If appropriate, the offender must successfully complete the program prior to release from Tier II.' Section IV.F.5.b: 'Offenders shall be assigned to Tier I upon completion of Tier II, if approved, as part of their reorientation to a less strict environment. The offender shall be monitored in Tier I for up to thirty (30) days before his or her release to general population.' Section IV.F.5.c.7: 'Prior to release from Tier I, the offender is to submit a written statement notifying the Warden and Regional Director that he or she can or cannot reside in general population.' Release from indefinite segregation is gated on a program being available and being completed, and adds up to a further 30 days in Tier I. The SOP contains no provision for what happens if the O.U.T. program is not offered at the facility.
solitary conditions policy
The exact records an open-records request should demand, named Data gap
Primary ask, the system of record: a report or query extract from SCRIBE listing, as of a date certain, every person assigned a Tier II, Tier II STEP, Tier III, Tier III STEP, administrative segregation, disciplinary isolation or protective custody housing status or profile, with facility, housing unit or wing, phase, date of initial assignment and cumulative days in that status, produced in the electronic format in which it is maintained. The Tier II SCRIBE module (live March 2019) and the Tier II Warden's Dashboard field for 'number of days an offender has spent in restrictive housing Tier II' (FY2020) should be named explicitly, because GDC's own annual reports establish both exist. O.C.G.A. § 50-18-71(f) supports production in native electronic format. Custodian: GDC Open Records, Office of Legal Services; the record-holding units are the Facilities Division and the Classification Unit, Offender Administration, which SOP 209.09 Section IV.C identifies as the office that 'will finalize the transfer request and assign the applicable profile in Scribe.' Fallback asks, all existing records named in policy: The Accountability Log required by SOP 209.06 Section IV.N and SOP 209.09 Section IV.R.5, recording 'cell number, bed number, offender name, offender number, race, in or out time, assignment of offender, and destination of offender,' and 'printed daily after 1800 hours ... once all daily scheduled offender moves have been completed in both SCRIBE and the offender-housing unit.' This is a same-day, cell-by-cell, bed-by-bed census of each Tier unit. SOP 209.07 Section VI.K and SOP 209.08 Section IV.P.6 impose the same requirement for Tier I and Tier II. The segregation admissions and releases register required by SOP 209.06, recording 'The offender's name and GDC#; Housing location; Date of action; Time of action; Reason for admission and tentative release date; and Authorizing official or committee.' This yields both population and length of stay. The Restrictive Housing Rounds Log, form M40-01-01, required weekly at every facility by SOP 508.20 Attachment 1 (effective 2022-08-02). At facilities without mental health services, Section IV.B.4 requires an entry of 'the offender's name and GDC identification number, restrictive housing unit identifier and officer on duty, time of entry and exit,' which is a weekly roster. At facilities with mental health services the tracked field is narrower, covering offenders in need of mental health services, so it is a partial roster there and a request should say so. The Sick Call Encounter Log for Restrictive Housing, form P-03-0005-11, one of seventeen mandatory tracking logs required by SOP 507.04.04 at all facilities 'including private and county prisons.' Division Director approvals for isolation beyond 30 days, required by Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-2-.10(f): 'No confinement to an isolation cell of greater than thirty (30) days shall be imposed without the review and approval of a Division Director of the Department of Corrections.' Counting these for a year gives a floor on long-stay isolation. The quarterly over-24-month Tier III panel reviews, SOP 209.09 Attachment 12, 'Tier III Program Over 2-Years 90-Day Quarterly Review Hearing Form,' plus the personal approvals by the Director, Field Operations or the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities that Section IV.A.1.i requires. Counting these yields the number held in Tier III beyond 24 months. The SMU Warden's written notices to the North Regional Director required by SOP 209.09 Section IV.E.1.l whenever out-of-cell time is cancelled or shortened for three or more consecutive days. The Electronic Logbook (NoteActive) door sheets and unit logs, the system of record for Tier III movement, recreation and out-of-cell time since the 2025 revision. The current GDC document designating facilities as Tier I, Tier II, Tier II STEP, Tier III and Tier III STEP sites, and the current facility security-level assignment list. Framing the request: ask for existing records, not analysis, because GDC's standard objection is that compiling a count creates a new record — an objection answered by GDC's own FY2019 and FY2020 annual reports and by the Accountability Log being printed daily by policy. Ask across the whole vocabulary — Tier I, Tier II, Tier III, extended restrictive housing, restrictive housing, administrative segregation, disciplinary isolation and protective custody — because GDC's own terminology drifts by year, and because SOP 209.45 and SOP 209.55 state affirmatively that 'The Tier II STEP is not a restrictive housing unit' and 'The Tier III STEP is not a restrictive housing unit,' a definitional carve-out that will shrink any production framed on a single term.
solitary demographics policy data_gap tier
Gumm v. Ford reaches Tier III and SMU only, not Tier II Finding
The central scope conclusion rests on four independent supports: (1) Every operative settlement term is written in Special Management Unit and Tier III vocabulary: a general 24-month limit on SMU confinement; a prohibition on housing Mental Health Level III or above in Tier III/SMU. (2) The class arose from conditions in the Special Management Unit at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison, a single facility. (3) GDC codified the settlement into SOP 209.09 alone. The Tier III SOP, revised effective 2025-04-23 and again effective 2026-06-18, carries the 24-month ceiling, the mental-health exclusion, the 60-day and 90-day mental-health evaluations, the quarterly panel of the Deputy Director, Field Operations, Statewide Mental Health Director, Statewide Medical Director and a member of the Office of Legal Services, and the requirement of personal approval by the Director, Field Operations or Assistant Commissioner for Facilities to hold anyone past 24 months. (4) SOP 209.08, governing Tier II, has none of it, and has not been revised since 2016-04-11 — nearly three years before the settlement. No duration cap. No mental-health exclusion. No panel. No mental-health evaluation requirement at placement. No out-of-cell minimum beyond five hours per week. The protections won in Gumm attached to the unit that was litigated, and to no other part of the Tier system. The programme with the least protection is the larger one.
solitary legal policy tier
Tier I SOP requires 30-minute documented checks and forbids batch 'gang' entries Policy
SOP 209.07, Section VI.L.1, on the Tier I Segregation/Isolation Checklist: the record shall 'Be completed daily with 30 minute documented checks. The 30 minute checks should be documented when they occur, not at the end of the shift ("gang" entries shall never be permitted on any of the Tier I Segregation/Isolation forms).'
solitary conditions policy tier
SOP 508.01 refers to designated SMHTU/TIER II facilities without naming them Policy
SOP 508.01, effective 2023, refers to 'designated SMHTU/TIER II facilities' without naming them. This is cited as evidence that the seven-facility designation may be stale and that a current designation document is missing.
solitary policy tier data_gap
Tier II duration: SOP 209.08 states none; audits and GDC's fact sheet do Finding
The Hays State Prison Cycle 2 audit describes Tier II as 'long-term segregation/270 days,' which appears nowhere in SOP 209.08 — the SOP states no duration at all. Macon's Cycle 2 and Cycle 4 audits describe Tier II as running 'from nine months to indefinite' and 'from 270 days to an indefinite date' respectively. Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 records a duration of 'up to two years' for Tier II progression. Outside the audits, GDC's Tier Segregation System fact sheet (current version, produced 2026-10-05 in open-records request R031710-091426) states 'Nine months minimum stay' and '90-days per phase/per review' for Tier II; it gives no maximum.
solitary policy facilities tier
Hays State Prison STEP beds Statistic
Hays State Prison had 59 STEP total beds, 59 occupied, 0 vacant, 100.00% occupied.
59 beds vs. 59 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier III / SMU is a 13-month minimum, 24-month maximum program, five wings Policy
SOP 209.09, 'Special Management Unit - Tier III Program,' effective 6/18/2026, Authority Commissioner, Facilities Division, 40 pages. PowerDMS id 105973. Section IV.A.1.a: 'The Tier III Program is a minimum 13 month (390 days) program. Offenders, if successful at each phase, shall spend at least sixty (60) days in E Wing, at least sixty (60) days in F Wing, at least ninety (90) days in D Wing, at least ninety (90) days in C Wing, and at least ninety (90) days in B Wing.' Section IV.A.1.b: 'There are five (5) phases, from the most restrictive (Phase 1) to the least restrictive (Phase 5).' Section IV.A.1.d: 'Offenders shall be initially placed in E Wing (Phase 1).' Section IV.A.1.f: 'Offenders shall not be held in the Tier III Program for more than 24 months. However, the Department reserves the right to retain offenders in the Tier III Program for a longer period of time if they meet one (1) of the following criteria:' committed a murder while incarcerated; 'Escaped or attempted escape from a secure correctional facility or law enforcement custody'; caused serious bodily injury; hostage taking; 'crimes are so egregious that the offender was placed in the Tier III Program immediately upon being placed in GDC custody'; or 'due to unique position of influence and authority over others, poses such an exceptional, credible, and articulable risk to the safe operation of the prison system or to the public that no facility other than the Tier III Program facility is sufficient to contain the risk.' Arithmetic check: 60 + 60 + 90 + 90 + 90 = 390 days, matching the stated 13-month minimum.
solitary policy legal
GDC has previously produced per-facility housing counts on request Finding
GPS open-records request R024615-101925, filed 2025-10-19 and completed, requested a 'Current count of inmates by security designation (Close, Medium, Minimum) housed at each Georgia Department of Corrections state prison,' and GDC produced per-facility count tables. The successor request R031471-090226 was filed 2026-09-02. GDC has demonstrated that it will run and produce a per-facility housing count query. That precedent materially strengthens a request for a per-facility Tier placement count, and undercuts a burden or new-record objection to one. No GPS open-records request has yet asked for Tier or segregation population data: of 43 GDC requests in the registry, none is segregation-related.
solitary demographics policy tier
Correction: existing GPS datapoint 6598 conflates Tier II with the SMU Methodology note
Existing GPS datapoint 6598 describes the Craig Haney expert findings adopted in Gumm v. Ford as applying to 'Tier II/SMU residents.' The Haney inspection and the certified class were the Special Management Unit at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison, not Tier II. The Gumm record supplies no findings about Tier II conditions at any other facility. This note is recorded rather than applied as an edit, so that the history of the collection is preserved. Anyone citing datapoint 6598 should cite it to the SMU. The distinction is material: the five-hours-per-week out-of-cell figure in the Gumm record is an SMU finding from 2017, and it happens to coincide with the figure that SOP 209.08 still sets as the Tier II policy floor today — but they are two separate facts about two different programmes and must not be presented as one.
solitary legal policy tier
Tier II SOP requires 30-minute checks documented when they occur Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.P.3: 'Upon placement of the offender in the cell, the "30 Minute/15 Minute Watch Form/Observation Record" (Attachment 10) of this SOP must be used. The 30 minute/15 minute checks shall be documented when they occur and not at the end of the shift.'
solitary conditions policy tier
SOP 209.09 revised effective 2025-04-23 and again effective 2026-06-18 Policy
SOP 209.09 was revised effective 2025-04-23 and again effective 2026-06-18. The version effective 6/18/2026 is the current one on PowerDMS (document 105973). Both revisions are material changes since the 2018-2019 fact sheets that may affect the Tier programme designation.
solitary policy tier
SOP 209.08 imposes no single-occupancy requirement for Tier II; SOP 209.06 treats single-celling as exception Policy
SOP 209.08 imposes no single-occupancy requirement for Tier II and SOP 209.06 treats single-celling in administrative segregation as an enumerated exception. This is the policy counterpart to the facility-level finding that double-bunked segregation and double-bunked Tier housing are the ordinary described condition at most Georgia facilities.
solitary policy facilities tier
Macon State Prison STEP beds Statistic
Macon State Prison had 20 STEP total beds, 20 occupied, 0 vacant, 100.00% occupied.
20 beds vs. 20 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Retention in Tier III past 24 months requires a four-member statewide panel and personal approval by the Director, Field Operations or the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities Policy
SOP 209.09 (effective 6/18/2026), Section IV.A.1.h: offenders recommended to remain past 24 months 'shall be reviewed quarterly, utilizing Attachment 12, by a panel made up of the Deputy Director, Field Operations, the Statewide Mental Health Director, the Statewide Medical Director, and a member of the Office of Legal Services.' Section IV.A.1.i: 'The Director, Field Operations or Assistant Commissioner for Facilities must personally approve any decision by the panel to retain an offender in the Tier III Program past 24 months.' Section IV.A.1.j lists the panel's criteria, including 'The offender's 60-day or 90-day mental health evaluation' and 'Total duration of the offender's confinement in the SMU.' These are the procedural protections that the 2019 Gumm v. Ford settlement imposed on the SMU (see existing GPS datapoint 6641, recording the settlement's general 24-month limit and mandatory 60/90-day reviews with out-of-cell mental health evaluations). No equivalent statewide panel, personal approval requirement, or outer duration limit appears anywhere in SOP 209.08 for Tier II. The protection is attached to the unit that was litigated, not to the program that holds more people.
solitary policy legal mental_health
The DOJ restrictive-housing findings are the pending external route to a Tier count Data gap
In April 2024 the United States Department of Justice expanded its Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act investigation of Georgia prisons to include restrictive housing, disciplinary practices and special education services. The findings report issued 1 October 2024 addressed only the violence and sexual-abuse prongs. The restrictive-housing findings have not been released. A CRIPA findings report on restrictive housing would ordinarily contain population, duration and per-facility figures obtained by compulsory process, which is why it is the most likely external source of a Tier population count. It remains unissued. GPS should treat the absence of the restrictive-housing findings as a live, dated gap rather than as evidence about Georgia's Tier population either way. Note on what the October 2024 report did find, which bears on Tier but is not Tier-specific: the DOJ findings letter of 1 October 2024 found that 'GDC fails to control violence even in its segregated housing units and exposes incarcerated persons to an unreasonable risk of harm due to its inappropriate use of segregated housing.' That investigation was scoped to medium- and close-security facilities and to violence and safety; it is a finding about segregated housing, not a finding about the Tier programme as such.
solitary legal policy data_gap tier
Tier III admission on escape no longer requires violence or repeated escapes (SOP 209.09, 6/18/2026) Policy
SOP 209.09, effective 6/18/2026, Section IV.B, 'Criteria for Admission to the Tier III Program,' criterion 2: 'Escaped or attempted escape from a secure correctional facility or law enforcement custody.' The 4/23/2025 version listed two escape criteria in its place: '2. Escape involving violence or serious threat of violence.' and '3. Multiple escapes or escape attempts within the previous three (3) years from a secure correctional facility or law enforcement custody.' The 2026 criterion has no violence condition, no requirement of more than one escape or attempt, and no three-year look-back. An offender needs only one listed criterion 'at the time of the request' to be eligible. The list now has ten criteria; the 2025 list had eleven, and the other criteria are unchanged in wording. The same escape wording now also appears as a criterion for retention past 24 months, Section IV.A.1.f.ii, where the 4/23/2025 version said 'Escaped outside the secure fencing of a facility.'
solitary policy tier
SOP 209.09 (6/18/2026) allows the mental health evaluation for Tier III placement to be done by telehealth Policy
SOP 209.09, effective 6/18/2026, adds the sentence 'Telehealth may be utilized to perform mental health evaluations.' in two places: Section IV.C.3, the evaluation by a licensed mental health provider 'to determine if the offender is suitable for placement in the Tier III Program,' and Section IV.C.16, the evaluation given on arrival at the SMU after an emergency placement. In the emergency paragraph the after-hours instruction changed from having a licensed mental health provider 'respond to the facility to perform the mental health evaluation' (4/23/2025) to having one 'perform the mental health evaluation' (6/18/2026). The 4/23/2025 version did not mention telehealth. The sentence appears only in Section IV.C. Section IV.F.2, which sets the 60-day and 90-day evaluations, was not changed and still requires 'an out of cell mental health evaluation, from a licensed mental health provider.'
solitary policy tier mental_health
SOP 209.09 (6/18/2026) gives Tier III final decisions to the Director, Field Operations instead of the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities Policy
In SOP 209.09 effective 6/18/2026, the decisions that the 4/23/2025 version gave to the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities go to the Director, Field Operations, and most steps that the 2025 version gave to the Director, Field Operations go to the Deputy Director, Field Operations. Assignment appeals, Sections IV.C.9 to IV.C.12: the appeal 'must be submitted to the Deputy Director, Field Operations (or designee)'; 'The Deputy Director, Field Operations shall review and render a decision on the assignment to the Tier III Program within seven (7) calendar days'; if the Deputy Director approves the placement, the appeal goes to the Director, Field Operations, who 'shall have three (3) calendar days to make the final decision on the offender's assignment to the Tier III Program.' Emergency placement, Section IV.C.16: 'The Deputy Director, Field Operations (or designee) may approve or disapprove an emergency placement of an offender to the Tier III Program.' Release to Tier III STEP, Sections IV.F.3.h and IV.F.5.h: the recommendation goes to the Deputy Director, Field Operations (or designee), and a disapproval goes to 'the Director, Field Operations for a final review and recommendation.' Appeals of the 90-day and 60-day reviews, Sections IV.F.4 and IV.F.6: 'The Director, Field Operations shall have ten (10) business days to review the offender's appeal and render the final decision.' Retention past 24 months, Section IV.A.1.i: 'The Director, Field Operations or Assistant Commissioner for Facilities must personally approve any decision by the panel to retain an offender in the Tier III Program past 24 months.' In the 4/23/2025 version the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities made the final decision on assignment appeals and on review appeals and gave the final review of a disapproved STEP release, and retention past 24 months needed the Commissioner or the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities. The time limits are unchanged.
solitary policy tier
Conditions found in the SMU in the Gumm record Legal fact
The court adopted findings, based on the Dr. Craig Haney expert report, that SMU residents were confined in cells 'smaller than the average parking space,' with as little as five hours per week out of cell, no outside light, no congregate religious or educational programming, and frequently locked food-port flaps. At the 2017 inspection the SMU held approximately 180 people, of whom 70 were designated mentally ill. Timothy Gumm himself was held continuously for seven and a half years despite fourteen transfer recommendations over four years. People were released directly from the SMU to the community at sentence expiration with no transitional programming. The preliminary approval order found that 'the prospective relief required by the settlement agreement was necessary to prevent violations of the inmates' constitutional rights, was narrowly tailored and extended no further than necessary to correct those violations, and was the least intrusive means of ensuring compliance with minimal constitutional requirements.' Haney's expert opinion, as quoted in the record, was that the SMU was 'one of the harshest and most draconian' he had seen 'in decades of conducting evaluations,' that residents were 'among the most psychologically traumatized persons [he] ha[d] ever assessed in this context,' and that the harm 'may be irreversible and even fatal.'
solitary conditions legal mental_health tier
SOPs 209.45 and 209.55 require 30-minute documented checks Policy
SOP 209.45 and SOP 209.55, Section IV.C.1.u: 'Offenders will be checked on and documented every thirty (30) minutes.'
solitary conditions policy tier
Baldwin State Prison audits describe K1, K2, K3 as Isolation/Segregation, never Tier Finding
Baldwin State Prison's PREA audits describe K1, K2 and K3 as 'Isolation/Segregation' and never as Tier. This is one of three close-security prisons whose audits contain no Tier language.
solitary facilities tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 security-level field reads 'Minimum' contradicting narrative Methodology note
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2's security-level field reads 'Minimum' while the same report's narrative states 'This facility is a close security institution' and gives the population as '379 Close Security, 768 Medium, 087 Minimum.'
facilities data_gap tier
Smith State Prison STEP beds Statistic
Smith State Prison had 20 STEP total beds, 14 occupied, 6 vacant, 70.00% occupied.
20 beds vs. 14 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Every person in Tier III is classified Close Security Policy
SOP 209.09, Section IV.A.2: 'All offenders assigned to the Tier III Program are classified as Close Security.' Section IV.A.3: 'If the offender successfully completes the Tier III Program, he or she will be considered for reassignment to the Tier III STEP Program with a Close Security status.' SOP 209.45, summary: 'All offenders in Tier II STEP are classified as Close Security.' SOP 209.55, summary: offenders in Tier III STEP 'are classified as Close Security.' GDC policy ties Tier III, Tier II STEP and Tier III STEP placement to the Close Security classification by definition. Tier placement and close-security status are formally linked in the policy text, not merely correlated in practice.
solitary facilities policy
Wilkinson v. Austin due-process trigger present in Tier II, absent from Tier III Legal fact
Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209 (2005) held that Ohio's supermax conditions — near-total solitary confinement, indefinite duration, and parole disqualification — imposed an 'atypical and significant hardship' giving rise to a Fourteenth Amendment liberty interest requiring informal, non-adversary procedural protections. The Court did not reach the Eighth Amendment. Applied to Georgia: the factor Wilkinson identified as central, indefinite duration, is present in Tier II, where SOP 209.08 sets no outer limit, and absent from Tier III, where SOP 209.09 sets a 24-month ceiling with enumerated exceptions and a quarterly panel. On Wilkinson's own reasoning the due-process argument is therefore stronger for Tier II than for the programme the litigation actually reformed. Status: this is an argument from a holding, not a holding. No court has applied Wilkinson to Georgia's Tier II programme. Library gap noted: Sandin v. Conner, the decision Wilkinson refines, is absent from the GPS research library entirely.
solitary legal policy tier
GDC policy anticipates falsification of 30-minute check records Finding
GDC anticipates in its own policy text that staff may falsify these records by completing them in a batch at the end of a shift, and expressly forbids it in Tier I with the phrase '"gang" entries shall never be permitted.' The prohibition is evidence that the practice was known. The forms are named, retained in the offender's case history file, and requestable.
solitary conditions policy tier
Phillips State Prison reports 100 isolation/segregation cells with no Tier language Finding
Phillips State Prison reports 100 isolation/segregation cells with no Tier language in its PREA audits. This is one of three close-security prisons whose audits contain no Tier language.
solitary facilities tier
Augusta State Medical Prison '50 Tier II Mental Health beds' ambiguous — not counted as Tier housing Methodology note
Augusta State Medical Prison Cycle 1's '50 Tier II Mental Health beds' is ambiguous: in GDC usage 'Level II' is also a mental-health classification, and Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 uses '49 Tier II Mental Health Offenders' for what reads as a mental-health designation. Augusta State Medical Prison is therefore NOT counted as a Tier-housing facility here.
solitary mental_health facilities data_gap tier
Tier II program totals Statistic
GPS arithmetic on GDC's figures: Tier II comprises 8 prisons, 884 beds, 804 occupied, 80 vacant (91.0% occupied).
884 beds vs. 804 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
Tier II reassignment is to a 'Level 5 facility' or the GDCP High Max Unit Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.F.2.b, listing the outcomes of the 90-day review, outcome 5: 'Reassigned in the current Phase at another Level 5 facility or GDCP High Max Unit.' The Tier II policy's own transfer provision presumes a class of 'Level 5' facilities capable of receiving a Tier II Phase assignment, plus a High Max Unit at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison. The SOP does not define 'Level 5' or list the facilities in that class.
solitary facilities policy
SCHR Georgia State Prison class action: Tier II conditions allegations Legal fact
Southern Center for Human Rights, Georgia State Prison conditions class action, filed September 2021. The complaint alleges approximately 300 people in Georgia State Prison's 'Tier II' programme, over 70 percent of them with serious mental illness; Acute Care Unit cells in which suicidal residents are 'confined for days without clothes, hygiene items, or toilet paper, in cells smeared in the previous occupants' feces and blood'; at least 12 suicides at Georgia State Prison between September 2019 and May 2021, nearly 30 percent of all GDC suicides in that window; and a correctional officer vacancy rate above 70 percent at filing. Status: allegations in a complaint, not findings. Georgia State Prison at Reidsville closed 2022-02-19. This is the closest thing to Tier II-specific litigation in GPS's corpora, and it is a serious-mental-illness and conditions case, not a retaliation case. No ADA or Rehabilitation Act claim specific to Georgia Tier II and serious mental illness appears anywhere in the corpora; that is undocumented.
solitary legal mental_health conditions tier
Board of Corrections Rule requires Division Director approval for isolation beyond 30 days Legal fact
Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-2-.10(f), Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. R. 125-3-2-.10: 'No confinement to an isolation cell of greater than thirty (30) days shall be imposed without the review and approval of a Division Director of the Department of Corrections.'
solitary legal policy tier
McRae Women's Facility has no PREA audit in the corpus Data gap
McRae Women's Facility has no PREA audit in the corpus under that name. This is noted as a limitation on the analysis of whether women's prisons operate Tier programmes.
solitary facilities demographics data_gap
Telfair State Prison Cycle 4 audit internally contradicts on administrative segregation capacity Methodology note
Telfair State Prison's Cycle 4 audit contradicts itself internally: 'The PCM indicated the facility does not have administrative segregation cells,' and, in the same report's interviews section, 'Through the interview process the facility head reported having 360 administrative segregation beds.' Telfair's Cycle 2 audit reported 280 segregation cells and called the prison 'a Tier I and Tier II Facility.' All three figures are irreconcilable from the documents.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Tier III program totals Statistic
GPS arithmetic on GDC's figures: Tier III comprises 1 location (the Special Management Unit), 160 beds, 128 occupied.
160 beds vs. 128 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
No SOP in the corpus lists which facilities are designated Tier facilities Data gap
SOP 209.08's own published summary states that the policy 'applies to designated Georgia Department of Corrections facilities.' Neither SOP 209.08 nor SOP 209.09, 209.45, 209.55 or 209.11 contains an applicability section listing the designated facilities, and a keyword search of the 1,432-document GPS SOP corpus for a Tier facility designation list returns nothing. SOP 209.08 refers to 'Level 5 facilit[ies]' without defining the term or naming them; SOP 508.01 refers to 'designated SMHTU/TIER II facilities' without naming them. The record that would answer this: the current GDC document that designates facilities as Tier I, Tier II, Tier II STEP, Tier III and Tier III STEP sites, together with the current GDC Facility Security Level assignment list. GDC has historically published this in fact-sheet form — GPS holds the GDC 'Tier Segregation System Fact Sheet' for 2018 and 2019 and the GDC 'Close Security Facility Fact Sheet' as sources — but no current edition is in the corpus. This is the single most load-bearing missing document for the question of Tier's system-wide scale.
solitary facilities data_gap
Tier duration against Mandela Rules' 15-day prolongation threshold Finding
The UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (Nelson Mandela Rules), adopted 17 December 2015, UN General Assembly Resolution 70/175: Rule 44 defines solitary confinement as confinement for 22 hours or more a day without meaningful human contact, and prolonged solitary confinement as solitary confinement in excess of 15 consecutive days. Rule 43 prohibits indefinite solitary confinement and prolonged solitary confinement in all circumstances. Rule 45 provides that solitary confinement shall be used only in exceptional cases as a last resort, for as short a time as possible, and subject to independent review. The Mandela Rules are persuasive and are not enforceable in United States courts. Setting the documented GDC durations against the 15-day threshold: Tier I, SOP 209.07 Section VI.H.2: 30 days maximum, 'to include investigation and disciplinary isolation time,' with voluntary and involuntary protective custody excepted. 30 / 15 = 2.0 times the threshold, and unbounded for protective custody. Tier II, SOP 209.08: no maximum duration stated. The 90-day review cycle is itself 6 times the threshold, and it is indefinitely repeatable. Total duration is unbounded. Tier III, SOP 209.09 Section IV.A.1.a: a stated minimum of 390 days (60 + 60 + 90 + 90 + 90). 390 / 15 = 26.0 times the threshold — as a floor, not a ceiling. A person who progresses successfully through every phase still serves 390 days. Tier III outer limit, SOP 209.09 Section IV.A.1.f: 24 months, approximately 730 days. 730 / 15 is approximately 48.7 times the threshold. Note the correct figure: SOP 209.09 states 'minimum 13 month (390 days) program' in its own parenthesis, and the five wing minimums sum to exactly 390. Use 390 days, not an approximation.
solitary legal policy conditions tier
Central Office approval records provide a floor on long-stay isolation counts Finding
A Central Office approval record exists for every isolation confinement beyond 30 days. Counting those approvals for a defined period would give a floor on long-stay isolation in Georgia, independent of any Tier population figure. Read with SOP 209.01 Section W, which caps disciplinary isolation at 30 days in prisons and transitional centres and 14 days in probation detention centres and integrated treatment facilities, and which designates a Tier II recommendation as the route when isolation time exceeds 30 days.
solitary legal policy data_gap tier
Tier I has five-hours-per-week out-of-cell floor Policy
Tier I is described as short-term segregation with a five-hours-per-week out-of-cell floor. SOP 209.07 Section II applies Tier I to all facility types system-wide.
solitary policy tier conditions
Georgia State Prison Cycle 3 audit is Cycle 2 audit republished — identical text Methodology note
Georgia State Prison's 'Cycle 3' audit is the Cycle 2 audit republished. The document at .../prea-georgia-state-prison-audit-cycle-3/download and the document at .../prea-georgia-sp-audit-cycle-2/download are both 181 pages and their extracted text is identical after whitespace normalisation — 546,523 characters, zero differences. Both carry a final report date of 2019-03-22 and October 2018 onsite dates. There is no distinct Cycle 3 PREA audit of Georgia State Prison published, and its segregation figure must not be counted twice.
facilities data_gap tier
STEP program totals Statistic
GPS arithmetic on GDC's figures: STEP comprises 4 prisons, 119 beds, 96 occupied, 23 vacant.
119 beds vs. 96 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
The juvenile restrictive-housing program mirrors Tier II and graduates into it Policy
SOP 209.11, 'Restrictive Housing Assignment - Juvenile Offender Administrative Segregation' (RHA-JOAS), effective 04/11/2016, Authority Bryson/Ward, 20 pages. PowerDMS id 105987. The policy governs juvenile offenders under 18 years old and uses the same multi-phase structure, the same three-phase visitation ladder, the same 'moderated-cell/strip-cell' cross-reference to SOP 209.05, and the same Warden modification clause as Tier II. Section IV.F.5 provides that on release review a juvenile may be 'Reassigned to the same phase of Tier II as the current Phase of RHA-JOAS, if of age.' Children in GDC custody are held under a program modelled on Tier II, and on turning 18 are transferred into the corresponding phase of adult Tier II, carrying their phase with them.
solitary conditions mental_health policy
Tier III's 24-month ceiling is qualified in the sentence that follows it Finding
SOP 209.09, Section IV.A.1.f, in sequence: 'Offenders shall not be held in the Tier III Program for more than 24 months. However, the Department reserves the right to retain offenders in the Tier III Program for a longer period of time if they meet one (1) of the following criteria,' followed by six criteria, the last of which is that the offender, 'due to unique position of influence and authority over others, poses such an exceptional, credible, and articulable risk to the safe operation of the prison system or to the public that no facility other than the Tier III Program facility is sufficient to contain the risk.' Fairness requires stating the countervailing safeguards, which are real: quarterly review using Attachment 12 against eight enumerated criteria including the 60-day or 90-day mental health evaluation and total duration of confinement in the SMU; a four-member statewide panel; and personal approval by the Director, Field Operations or Assistant Commissioner for Facilities. Someone held past 24 months who has completed the programme is placed in Phase 5 under Section IV.A.1.g. The outer limit is stated and then immediately qualified, so it operates as a presumption subject to override by the Director, Field Operations or the Assistant Commissioner for Facilities rather than as a cap. But it is a presumption with a named decision-maker, a named form, a fixed review interval and a multi-disciplinary panel — none of which exists anywhere in Tier II.
solitary legal policy tier
SOP 209.01 caps disciplinary isolation at 30 days in prisons, 14 days in other facilities Policy
SOP 209.01 Section W caps disciplinary isolation at 30 days in prisons and transitional centres and 14 days in probation detention centres and integrated treatment facilities, and designates a Tier II recommendation as the route when isolation time exceeds 30 days.
solitary policy tier
Tier III Special Management Unit has held 149 to 195 people across published monthly series Statistic
The Tier III Special Management Unit has held 149 to 195 people across the whole published monthly series. This is referenced as the only system-wide Tier population figure GDC publishes.
149 people (minimum) vs. 195 people (maximum)
solitary facilities tier demographics
Emanuel Women's Facility Cycle 5 audit published twice identically Methodology note
Emanuel Women's Facility's Cycle 5 audit is published twice, at .../prea-emanuel-wf-audit-cycle-5/download and .../prea-emanuel-wf-audit-cycle-5-0/download, identical, 151 pages each.
facilities data_gap
Combined Tier II, Tier III and STEP totals Statistic
All three programs together: 1,163 beds, 1,028 occupied, on the single undated snapshot GDC produced in early October 2026.
1,163 beds vs. 1,028 occupied beds
facilities operations solitary
The juvenile program's out-of-cell floor is identical to adult Tier II Policy
SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.g: 'Juvenile Offenders will be offered a minimum of five (5) hours per week of exercise. This exercise must be outside the cells, unless security, safety or inclement weather considerations dictate otherwise.' Section IV.E.1.b: 'Each juvenile offender must be provided the opportunity for personal hygiene three (3) times per week.' Section IV.E.1.e: 'Daily contact of juveniles receiving mental health services will occur by a MH Counselor to determine if lockdown is contra-indicated due to an increase in psychiatric symptoms.' Section IV.E.1.f: 'a minimum of one monthly MH Counselor contact out-of cell, and weekly out-of cell groups, based on the treatment plan and availability of security staff.' The five-hours-per-week exercise floor for a person under 18 is identical to the adult Tier II floor and yields the same 23.3 hours per day in cell. The out-of-cell mental-health group entitlement is expressly conditioned on 'availability of security staff.'
solitary conditions policy
Mandela Rule 44's two elements and why cell occupancy decides the second Methodology note
Mandela Rule 44's definition of solitary confinement has two elements: confinement for 22 hours or more a day, AND the absence of meaningful human contact. GPS can establish the first element for Tier I, Tier II and the juvenile programme by arithmetic from GDC's own out-of-cell minimums: a five-hour weekly exercise entitlement leaves 163 hours per week in cell, or 23.3 hours per day, which exceeds 22. GPS cannot establish the second element from the SOPs, and must not assume it. SOP 209.09 and SOP 209.55 guarantee single occupancy in Tier III and Tier III STEP. SOP 209.45 permits double occupancy in Tier II STEP. SOP 209.08 is silent on occupancy in Tier II, and SOP 209.06 Section IV.G treats single-celling in administrative segregation as an enumerated exception requiring justification, which implies that multiple occupancy is the ordinary condition. The consequence: where a Tier II cell is single-occupancy, the arithmetic and the no-meaningful-contact element may both be satisfied, and Rule 44 is engaged. Where a Tier II cell is double-bunked, the person is in cell 23.3 hours a day but is not without human contact in the Rule 44 sense, because a cellmate is present. The honest framing is therefore that Tier I and Tier II impose 23.3 hours per day in cell as a policy floor, and that whether this constitutes solitary confinement within Rule 44 turns on cell occupancy, which GDC does not specify for Tier II and does not publish for any facility. This is not a weakness in the argument; it is the argument. Two conditions of confinement are being run in the same programme under the same rules — 23 hours a day alone in a cell, and 23 hours a day locked in a cell with another person — and GDC's Tier II policy distinguishes neither, guarantees neither, and reports neither. Obtaining actual out-of-cell hours and cell-occupancy status for Tier I and Tier II by facility is the highest-value single records request arising from this research.
solitary conditions legal policy tier
GPS curated SOP topic on restrictive housing and segregation exists Methodology note
GPS's internal SOP wiki holds a published curated topic, 'Restrictive Housing and Segregation in Georgia Department of Corrections' (topic 8, slug restrictive-housing-and-segregation), drawing on 30 SOPs. Its summary identifies the architecture — 'Disciplinary Isolation, Administrative Segregation (with Tier I, Tier II, and Tier III programs), Protective Custody, and specialized juvenile programs — each governed by separate SOPs with distinct placement criteria, procedural requirements, and time limits.' Its recorded gaps include the medical-monitoring frequency conflict between Board Rule 125-4-4-.08 and SOP 507.04.33, and its findings include that Board Rule 125-3-1-.03 requires a formal Administrative Segregation hearing within 96 hours of involuntary placement with written notice, and that SOP 209.03 caps Disciplinary Isolation at 30 days and prohibits its use as corporal punishment.
solitary policy tier
Existing GPS datapoints 6593 and 6595 should be read with 2018-2019 qualification Methodology note
Existing GPS datapoints 6593 and 6595 should be read with the qualification that the seven-facility Tier I and II designation derives from 2018-2019 fact sheets and may be stale. A current designation document is the record that would replace them.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
'Does not have administrative segregation cells' form response contradicts earlier audits at Rogers and Montgomery Methodology note
The same 'does not have administrative segregation cells' form response appears in Cycle 4 and 5 audits of prisons whose own earlier audits reported substantial segregation capacity: Rogers State Prison Cycle 4 against Rogers Cycle 2's 95, and Montgomery State Prison Cycle 5 against Montgomery's 8 plus 8 in Cycle 2 and 16 in Cycle 3.
solitary facilities data_gap
Four Tier II prisons at or near full occupancy Finding
Four of the eight Tier II prisons were at or within one bed of full: Hays (151 of 151), Telfair (117 of 117), Ware (138 of 138), Hancock (82 of 83). Macon was at 119 of 121. Valdosta had the most room: 49 of its 129 Tier II beds were empty.
facilities operations solitary
Juveniles in RHA-JOAS receive CONTACT visits; adults in Tier II do not Policy
SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.j: 'Phase One (1): 1 monthly, contact visit with a maximum of two (2) visitors for up to two (2) hours in duration; Phase Two (2): up to 2 contact visits per month ...; Phase Three (3): up to 3 contact visits per month ...' SOP 209.08, Section IV.D.1.i, for adults: 'all visits in the Tier II Program, shall be limited as follows: PHASE One (1): 1 monthly, non-contact visit with a maximum of two (2) visitors for up to two (2) hours in duration; PHASE Two (2): up to two (2) non-contact visits per month ...; PHASE Three (3): up to three (3) non-contact visits per month ...' The two policies are otherwise near-identical in structure, and the juvenile version is the more generous one on exactly this point. Adults in Tier II are limited to non-contact visits at every phase.
solitary conditions policy
ACA restrictive-housing standards are not in GPS's corpora Data gap
GPS research collection 106 contains no ACA material. The library's ACA holdings concern food service, accreditation as a compliance shield, and PREA, and none of them addresses restrictive-housing duration, review intervals or out-of-cell minimums. What is available: the Tier SOPs cite ACA standards by number. SOP 209.07 Section III.C cites ACA Standards 3-4237, 3-4238, 3-4239, 3-4241, 3-4242, 3-4246, 3-4247, 3-4248, 3-4249, 3-4250, 3-4251, 3-4253, 3-4254, 3-4255, 3-4256, 3-4257, 3-4258, 3-4259 and 3-4261. SOP 209.08 Section II cites ACA Standards 4-4140, 4-4184, 4-4185, 4-4235, 4-4249, 4-4251, 4-4252, 4-4253, 4-4254, 4-4255, 4-4257, 4-4258, 4-4259, 4-4260, 4-4261, 4-4263, 4-4264, 4-4265, 4-4266, 4-4267, 4-4268, 4-4269, 4-4270, 4-4271, 4-4272, 4-4273, 4-4281, 4-4400. SOP 227.02 cites ACA Standards 2-CO-3C-01, 4-4281 (Ref. 3-4268) (MANDATORY), 4-4284 and 4-4394. What is missing: the text of those standards. ACA standards are not public and are not held by GPS, so GPS currently cannot say whether Georgia's Tier programmes meet the standards GDC itself cites as their authority. Settling it requires the ACA Performance-Based Standards and Expected Practices for Adult Correctional Institutions, 5th edition (March 2021), restrictive-housing chapter, plus GDC's own ACA audit reports for the designated Tier facilities — the audit reports being obtainable by open-records request as records GDC holds, since ACA will not release them. GDC cites ACA compliance as authority for its segregation policies while the standards cited are unavailable for public verification. That asymmetry is itself a finding.
solitary legal policy data_gap tier
Board Rule 125-4-4-.08 requires medical checks three times weekly for segregation and isolation Legal fact
Board of Corrections Rule 125-4-4-.08 requires medical checks three times weekly for administrative segregation and disciplinary isolation, creating a conflict with SOP 507.04.33's daily rounds requirement.
solitary legal medical policy tier
Existing GPS datapoint 6614 corresponds to Georgia State Prison Tier II figure Methodology note
The approximately 300 people in Georgia State Prison's Tier II programme corresponds to existing GPS datapoint 6614. This is flagged as an update/confirmation of existing data.
solitary facilities tier
Pre-Audit Questionnaire segregation fields contradict same audit's narrative in at least three cases Methodology note
Pre-Audit Questionnaire segregation fields contradict the same audit's own physical description in at least three cases. Georgia State Prison Cycle 2's questionnaire says 12 segregation cells while its narrative itemises 106 Tier I cells at E-South, 218 Tier II beds at G Building and 100 Tier II single lockdown cells at K Building. Telfair Cycle 2's questionnaire says 280 while its narrative describes an isolation and segregation unit of '40 single cells and 40 double-bunked cells.' Hancock Cycle 2's questionnaire says 320 while its narrative says 'J Building - Tier 1/Segregation ... There are 20 cells in the unit.'
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Hays State Prison largest restrictive-housing program outside SMU Finding
Hays State Prison holds the largest restrictive-housing program outside the SMU: 151 Tier II beds plus 59 STEP beds, 210 in all, every one occupied.
facilities operations solitary
Juvenile restrictive housing may not be an open dormitory Policy
SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.o-q: juveniles 'shall not be assigned in a housing unit in which they will have sight, sound, or physical contact with any adult offender through use of a shared dayroom or other common space, shower area, or sleeping quarters'; 'The housing unit shall not be open dormitory'; and outside housing units they 'will maintain sight and sound separation from adult offenders, or there will be direct staff supervision.' GDC's juvenile segregation policy expressly forbids open-dormitory housing. No parallel prohibition appears in SOP 209.08 for adult Tier II.
solitary conditions facilities policy
GDC characterises Tier III as incentive-based and STEP programmes as non-restrictive Policy
SOP 209.09, Section IV.A.1: a Tier III offender 'is given the opportunity to progress through the program's phases based upon his or her behavior and ability to adjust under reduced levels of supervision,' with progressively more privileges across five phases. SOP 209.45 and SOP 209.55 each state affirmatively that the STEP programme 'is not a restrictive housing unit.' Recorded so that GDC's framing travels with the evidence, and because the STEP statement is operationally significant: it is a definitional carve-out that will exclude the step-down population from any GDC production framed on the term 'restrictive housing.' Note the tension with the same SOPs' conditions: a programme in which people are locked in a cell 20 hours a day, with non-contact visits only, is classified by GDC as not restrictive housing.
solitary policy tier
Board Rule 125-3-1-.03 requires Administrative Segregation hearing within 96 hours Legal fact
Board Rule 125-3-1-.03 requires a formal Administrative Segregation hearing within 96 hours of involuntary placement with written notice.
solitary legal policy tier
Coastal State Prison Cycle 1 '74-bed segregation unit' vs Cycle 2 '74 segregation cells' — unit of measure shift Methodology note
Coastal State Prison's Cycle 1 audit says 'a 74-bed segregation unit' while its Cycle 2 questionnaire gives 74 segregation CELLS — the same number one cycle apart with a different unit of measure.
solitary facilities data_gap
First per-facility count of Georgia's Tier II population from GDC Finding
This is the first per-facility count of Georgia's Tier II population GPS holds from GDC. GDC does not publish Tier II or STEP populations; the only Tier population it publishes is the Special Management Unit's, because the SMU is carried as its own facility in the monthly Inmate Statistical Profile.
policy operations solitary data_gap
Tier II's out-of-cell floor is five hours per week Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.D.1.f: 'Offenders will be offered a minimum of five (5) hours per week of exercise. This exercise must be outside the cells, unless security, safety or inclement weather considerations dictate otherwise.' Unlike Tier I and generic Administrative Segregation, SOP 209.08 specifies no daily distribution. The five hours may lawfully be delivered in any pattern across the week.
solitary conditions policy
SOP 209.03 caps Disciplinary Isolation at 30 days and prohibits corporal punishment use Policy
SOP 209.03 caps Disciplinary Isolation at 30 days and prohibits its use as corporal punishment.
solitary policy tier
Label defects leave unit of measure undetermined in Washington, Dooly, Pulaski audits Methodology note
Label defects leave the unit of measure undetermined: Washington Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation units 48' where 48 is implausible as housing units at a prison the same table credits with 13; Dooly Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation 71' with the noun missing entirely; Pulaski Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation units 1,' which is not comparable to a cell count and is excluded from totals.
solitary facilities data_gap
McRae Women's Facility only women's facility on Tier II list Finding
McRae Women's Facility is the only women's facility on GDC's Tier II list. Its Tier II unit had 34 beds and 28 occupied.
facilities demographics solitary
Tier I's out-of-cell floor is five hours per week across five days Policy
SOP 209.07, Section VI.E.10: 'Exercise periods shall be available for a minimum of five (5) hours per week, with at least one (1) hour per day on five days. This exercise shall be outside the cells, unless security or safety considerations dictate otherwise.' The entitlement covers five days, leaving two days per week on which the policy guarantees no out-of-cell time at all.
solitary conditions policy
New contributions of this research collection beyond existing curated topic Methodology note
The curated topic covers the SOP architecture; what is new in this collection is the per-stage conditions arithmetic, the scale and published-count analysis, the Gumm scope conclusion, and the records-request specification.
solitary policy tier
Cycle 1 audits are 2-4 page summaries with no Physical Plant table Methodology note
Cycle 1 audits are two-to-four-page auditor summaries with no Physical Plant table, so most contribute nothing quantitative even for prisons that later report hundreds of cells.
facilities data_gap
Eight of twelve Close-security prisons appear on Tier II list Finding
Of the 12 state prisons GDC classified as Close security as of 2026-09-13, eight appear on the Tier II list (Hancock, Hays, Macon, McRae Women's, Smith, Telfair, Valdosta, Ware). Four do not: Augusta State Medical Prison, Baldwin State Prison, Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison and Phillips State Prison. Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison appears only as a STEP location (20 beds, 3 occupied); the Special Management Unit sits on its grounds. Arrendale State Prison (classified Mixed Close/Medium) does not appear. The table does not say whether the prisons missing from it run any restrictive housing beyond Tier I.
facilities operations solitary
Generic Administrative Segregation's floor is one hour per day, five days per week Policy
SOP 209.06, 'Administrative Segregation,' effective 02/19/2021, Authority Commissioner, 21 pages. PowerDMS id 105940. Section IV.H.19: 'Exercise: Offenders shall receive a minimum of one (1) hour of exercise per day outside of their assigned cells, five (5) days per week, unless security or safety considerations dictate otherwise.'
solitary conditions policy
Six state facilities contribute zero segregation cell counts despite published audits Data gap
At least six state facilities with published audits contribute zero to the segregation cell total because no audit of them ever states a figure: Arrendale State Prison (three audits), Augusta State Medical Prison (four audits), Walker State Prison (five audits), Helms Facility, Emanuel Unit, and McRae Women's Facility (no audit in the corpus under that name).
solitary facilities data_gap
Table covers only Tier II, Tier III and STEP Methodology note
The table covers Tier II, Tier III and STEP only. GPS's request excluded Tier I, disciplinary isolation and protective custody, which GDC operates at every facility, so 1,163 beds is not a total of Georgia's segregation beds. It must not be compared directly with the 2,721 beds GDC's FY2014 Annual Fiscal Report says were 'converted to Tier beds' at implementation, or with audit-reported segregation-cell counts, which include Tier I.
policy operations solitary data_gap
Derived in-cell hours per day at each stage of the Tier system Statistic
This datapoint is DERIVED by arithmetic from the out-of-cell minimums quoted above. It states what GDC policy guarantees as a floor, not what any individual actually experiences, and not an observed average. A week contains 168 hours. Tier I (SOP 209.07, 5 hrs/week): 168 - 5 = 163 hours per week in cell; 163 / 7 = 23.3 hours per day average. On the two days outside the five-day exercise entitlement, the guaranteed out-of-cell time is zero, so the floor on those days is 24 hours in cell. Tier II (SOP 209.08, 5 hrs/week): 168 - 5 = 163 hours per week in cell; 163 / 7 = 23.3 hours per day average. No daily distribution is specified. Administrative Segregation generally (SOP 209.06, 1 hr/day x 5 days = 5 hrs/week): 168 - 5 = 163 hours per week in cell; 23.3 hours per day average; 24 hours on the two non-exercise days. RHA-JOAS, juveniles (SOP 209.11, 5 hrs/week): 168 - 5 = 163 hours per week in cell; 23.3 hours per day average. Tier II STEP (SOP 209.45, 4 hrs/day, 7 days/week): 4 x 7 = 28 hours per week out of cell; 168 - 28 = 140 hours in cell; 140 / 7 = 20.0 hours per day. Tier III / SMU (SOP 209.09, 4 hrs/day, Monday through Friday): 4 x 5 = 20 hours per week out of cell; 168 - 20 = 148 hours in cell; 148 / 7 = 21.1 hours per day average. Saturday and Sunday carry no guaranteed out-of-cell time, so the floor on those days is 24 hours in cell. Tier III STEP (SOP 209.55, 4 hrs/day, 7 days/week): 20.0 hours per day, as Tier II STEP.
23.3 hours per day in cell (Tier I, Tier II, Admin Seg, RHA-JOAS) vs. 20 hours per day in cell (Tier II STEP, Tier III STEP)
solitary conditions policy
Most recent audits of five of nine Tier prisons dropped segregation-cell field Data gap
The most recent audits of five of the nine Tier prisons — Georgia Diagnostic and Classification, Hays, Smith, Macon and Wilcox — dropped the segregation-cell field, so those facilities contribute older numbers to the system-wide total.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
SMU bed count discrepancy across GDC sources Data gap
The table shows 160 Tier III beds with 128 occupied at the Special Management Unit. GDC's FY2017 Annual Fiscal Report described the SMU as 192 beds, and GDC's monthly Inmate Statistical Profile counted 154 people in the Special Management Unit as of 2026-09-01 (149 on 2026-07-01, 152 on 2026-08-01). The two GDC sources differ by date and by what they count (Tier III program beds versus everyone housed at the SMU facility); the table does not explain the difference, and GPS has not established the reason.
facilities operations solitary data_gap
The step-down programs guarantee 5.6 times more out-of-cell time than Tier II itself Finding
Derived from the figures above. Tier II STEP guarantees 28 hours out of cell per week; Tier II guarantees 5. 28 / 5 = 5.6. Tier III guarantees 20 hours per week; Tier II guarantees 5. 20 / 5 = 4.0. The two adjacent stages of the same GDC system differ by a factor of 5.6 in guaranteed out-of-cell time, and the stage labelled by GDC as the MOST restrictive (Tier III, the Special Management Unit) guarantees four times more out-of-cell time than Tier II, which GDC describes as long-term administrative segregation and which is operated at multiple facilities rather than one.
solitary conditions policy
GDC FY2014 Annual Fiscal Report: 2,721 beds converted to Tier beds at all Level V facilities Statistic
GDC's FY2014 Annual Fiscal Report states that 2,721 beds were converted to Tier beds at all Level V facilities. This is flagged as a comparison of unlike measures with the PREA-derived figure of 3,401 segregation cells: the PREA figure is a cell count of all segregation across all facility types and a decade later. The two are not the same measure and must not be presented as a trend.
2,721 Tier beds converted vs. 3,401 PREA-derived segregation cell count (different measure)
solitary facilities budget tier
Occupied beds are point-in-time, not admissions Methodology note
Occupied beds are a point-in-time figure on an undated snapshot. They are not admissions, lengths of stay, or the number of people who passed through Tier II in a year.
operations solitary data_gap
Tier I, Tier II, Administrative Segregation and the juvenile program all meet the Mandela Rules definition of solitary confinement as a matter of policy floor Finding
Derived. The UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules) Rule 44 defines solitary confinement as confinement for 22 hours or more per day without meaningful human contact, and prolonged solitary confinement as solitary confinement in excess of 15 consecutive days; Rule 43(1)(b) prohibits prolonged solitary confinement. Existing GPS datapoints 6631 and the Mandela entries in collection 106 record these thresholds. Setting the derived floors against that threshold: Tier I, Tier II, generic Administrative Segregation and RHA-JOAS all have policy floors of 23.3 hours per day in cell, which exceeds the 22-hour threshold. Tier III averages 21.1 hours per day and so falls below the 22-hour threshold on weekdays, but reaches 24 hours on Saturdays and Sundays, when no out-of-cell time is guaranteed. Tier II STEP and Tier III STEP, at 20.0 hours per day, fall below the threshold. On duration: Tier I's 30-day cap is twice the 15-day prolongation threshold, and is disapplied entirely for protective custody. Tier II has no cap. Tier III's 13-month minimum of 390 days is 26 times the 15-day threshold (390 / 15 = 26), and its 24-month outer limit of roughly 730 days is approximately 48 times it. On GDC's own written minimums, the reformed unit sits outside the Mandela definition of solitary confinement on weekdays while the larger, unreformed Tier I and Tier II programs, and the program for children, sit inside it every day of the week.
solitary conditions legal policy
Macon State Prison Cycle 2 and Cycle 4 Tier II duration descriptions Finding
Macon's Cycle 2 and Cycle 4 audits describe Tier II as running 'from nine months to indefinite' and 'from 270 days to an indefinite date' respectively. These are among the only duration figures for Tier II in any GDC document GPS holds.
solitary policy facilities tier
Hancock Tier II capacity differs from earlier audit figure Finding
Per-facility audit figures in GPS's earlier work (for example Hancock's G-1 'Tier 2' unit described in PREA audits as housing a maximum of 96 in double-occupancy cells) are audit-reported capacities from earlier years; GDC's 2026 figure for Hancock is 83 Tier II beds.
facilities operations solitary
Tier II conditions, quoted in full Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.D, 'Conditions and Privileges,' in GDC's own words: Cells: 'All cells must be equipped and furnished in a manner consistent with cells designated as Tier II cells.' (Note: this is circular — Tier II cells must be furnished like Tier II cells. Tier III, Tier II STEP and Tier III STEP all instead require furnishing 'consistent with cells in the general population.') Hygiene: 'Each offender must be provided the opportunity for personal hygiene three (3) times per week.' Food: 'Food provided to offenders must be the same quality and quantity as that provided in the general population.' Strip cells: 'If an offender is placed in a moderated-cell/strip-cell, SOP 209.05 (IIB08-0005) and Post Orders will govern what bedding supplies are provided.' Counselling: 'Offenders will receive the services of a counselor and a Mental Health counselor as appropriate/required.' Exercise: 'a minimum of five (5) hours per week.' Telephone: 'All telephone calls will be in accordance with limitations outlined by phase assignments.' (The SOP does not state the limits; they live in the phase chart.) Visitation: non-contact only, 1/2/3 visits per month by phase, two visitors, two hours; 'The Warden/Designee may make adjustments to visitation privileges based on institutional needs and space availability.' Legal access: 'All offenders in the Tier II Program must be allowed legal access as provided in SOP 227.03.' Phase 3 privileges: 'Privileges for offenders who must remain in Phase 3 because of the safety and security of the institutional operation are outline on Attachment 4.' Religion: 'Subject to the facility's interests in maintaining security and order, offenders may individually pray or individually engage in religious practices in their assigned cells or by their assigned beds. All offenders may have access to Chaplaincy visits as scheduled.'
solitary conditions policy
Metro Reentry Facility Cycle 4: zero administrative segregation beds reported Statistic
Metro Reentry Facility Cycle 4 audit states: 'the facility head reported having zero administrative segregation beds.'
0 administrative segregation beds
solitary facilities reentry
No as-of date on the table Data gap
The table carries no as-of date.
data_gap operations
A single clause lets the Warden modify every Tier II condition Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.D.1.l: 'As deemed necessary by the Warden/Designee, all of the above conditions or privileges are subject to modification due to extenuating operational circumstances.' The identical clause appears at SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.n for juveniles: 'As deemed necessary by the Warden or Designee, all of the above conditions and privileges are subject to modification due to extenuating operational circumstances.' Every condition quoted above — hygiene, food, exercise, telephone, visitation, counselling — is subject to modification by the Warden or the Warden's designee on a finding of 'extenuating operational circumstances,' a term the SOP does not define. The clause carries no time limit, no documentation requirement, no notice to the prisoner, and no reporting obligation to Central Office. By contrast, SOP 209.09 (Tier III, effective 6/18/2026) requires that comparable exceptions be 'recorded in the Electronic Logbook ... and justified in writing,' and requires written notification to the North Regional Director when out-of-cell time is cancelled for three or more consecutive days. Tier II has no equivalent.
solitary conditions policy legal
Riverbend Correctional Facility Cycle 4: 50 segregation beds and 25 isolation beds Statistic
Riverbend Correctional Facility, private, Cycle 4 audit states: 'one lockdown unit with 50 segregation beds and 25 isolation beds.'
50 segregation beds vs. 25 isolation beds
solitary facilities conditions
No split of STEP between Tier II STEP and Tier III STEP Data gap
The table lists STEP locations under a single 'STEP' heading and does not say which are Tier II STEP and which are Tier III STEP.
data_gap operations solitary
Tier II's religious-practice clause refers to 'assigned beds,' implying non-single-cell housing Policy
SOP 209.08, Section IV.D.1.m: offenders 'may individually pray or individually engage in religious practices in their assigned cells or by their assigned beds.' The same phrasing appears at SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.l. The alternative 'or by their assigned beds' only has work to do if some people in Tier II housing are assigned a bed within a shared space rather than a cell of their own. The clause is not a statement of occupancy policy, but it is drafted on the assumption that Tier II housing is not uniformly single-cell.
solitary conditions facilities policy
Autry State Prison Cycle 3: segregation unit with 86 beds and 47 beds for isolation and protective custody Statistic
Autry State Prison Cycle 3 audit describes 'a segregation unit with 86 beds and 47 beds for isolation and protective custody.'
86 segregation beds vs. 47 isolation and protective custody beds
solitary facilities conditions
No count of people, time series, or lengths of stay Data gap
The production contains no count of people (as opposed to occupied beds), no time series, and no lengths of stay, which the request deliberately did not ask for.
data_gap operations solitary
Tier II contains no single-occupancy requirement; Tier III and Tier III STEP require it Finding
SOP 209.09, Section IV.E.1.a: 'All cells are single occupancy. This applies to offenders in Phase 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5.' SOP 209.55, Section IV.C.1.a: 'All cells are single occupancy.' SOP 209.45, Section IV.C.1.a: 'Cells may be single or double occupancy.' SOP 209.08 contains no provision on cell occupancy at all. Within one system, GDC has written an express single-occupancy guarantee into Tier III and Tier III STEP, an express permission to double-occupy into Tier II STEP, and nothing at all into Tier II. The Tier level determines whether a person is held alone or with a cellmate, and the guarantee attaches only to the Tier III side.
solitary conditions facilities policy
Baldwin State Prison Cycle 4: K1 33 inmates, K2 34, K3 50 Statistic
Baldwin State Prison Cycle 4 audit reports K1 housing 33 inmates, K2 34, K3 50.
117 inmates across K1-K3
solitary facilities conditions
Single-celling in GDC Administrative Segregation is an exception requiring justification Finding
SOP 209.06, Section IV.G, 'Housing Exceptions': 'Under the following conditions, it might be necessary to house an offender in Administrative Segregation in a single cell (this section does not apply to offenders in Protective Custody, see Section IV.B. above): 1. Offender with severe medical disabilities (assigned by Medical and evaluated within 24-hours of placement); 2. Offenders suffering from serious mental illness (assigned by Mental Health Staff and evaluated within 48-hours of placement); 3. Sexual Predators (assigned by the Classification Committee and evaluated within 48-hours of placement); 4. Offenders likely to be exploited or victimized by others ...; and 5. Offenders who have other special needs for single housing ...' GDC's most recent segregation policy (2021) treats a single cell in administrative segregation as the exception, enumerated and requiring assignment by medical, mental-health or classification staff plus evaluation within 24 or 48 hours. The necessary implication of the drafting is that multiple-occupancy is the ordinary condition of GDC administrative-segregation housing. This is the policy-side counterpart to the double-bunked segregation units recorded in GDC's own PREA facility audits.
solitary conditions facilities mental_health policy
Pulaski State Prison Cycle 4: up to 30 isolation/segregation cells for up to 43 offenders Statistic
Pulaski State Prison Cycle 4 audit states 'up to 30 isolation/segregation cells for up to 43 offenders.'
30 isolation/segregation cells vs. 43 offenders capacity
solitary facilities conditions
Protective-custody prisoners may not be double-bunked except in emergencies, with two different Central Office signatories named Policy
SOP 209.06, Section IV.B.6: 'Offenders in Protective Custody shall not be double bunked except in emergency situations. In an emergency, the Deputy Warden/Assistant Superintendent/Unit Manager/Duty Officer will notify the Warden/Superintendent of the situation and the Warden/Superintendent shall contact the Regional Director for approval. This approval shall not exceed 72-hours. Offenders housed in this manner beyond the 72-hour time limit shall be approved in writing by the Director of Field Operations.' SOP 209.07, Section VI.A.6, on the same subject, names a different final signatory: 'Offenders housed in this manner beyond the 72-hour time limit must be approved in writing by the Director of Facilities Operations or his/her designee.' Two GDC SOPs governing the same decision name two different Central Office officials as the required written approver. Recorded here as a documented conflict in the corpus, and as a records lead: whichever office holds them, these written approvals exist.
solitary conditions policy
Central State Prison Cycle 2: 24 Isoltion/Segregation beds as printed Statistic
Central State Prison Cycle 2 audit states '24 Isoltion/Segregation beds' as printed.
24 isolation/segregation beds
solitary facilities conditions
Tier III conditions, quoted — the reformed standard Policy
SOP 209.09, Section IV.E.1, effective 6/18/2026: 'All cells are single occupancy. This applies to offenders in Phase 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5.' Cells 'equipped and furnished in a manner consistent with cells in the general population.' 'Toiletries and personal hygiene items must be provided on the same basis as the general population.' 'Each offender must be provided the opportunity for a shower and shave three (3) times per week.' Food same as general population; alternative meal service only on health or safety grounds, 'with the written approval of the SMU Warden or designee and responsible health authority,' and 'The substitution period shall not exceed seven (7) calendar days.' 'Offenders must be provided the same bedding supplies as are provided offenders in the general population.' Same laundry and barbering as general population; 'Exceptions are permitted only when found necessary by the SMU Warden or designee; any exception is recorded in the Electronic Logbook (Note Active) unit log and justified in writing.' Recreation: 'a minimum of one (1) hour of recreation per day, Monday through Friday ... outside in the recreation pens,' documented per individual in the Electronic Logbook door sheet. Out of cell: 'All offenders shall receive a minimum of four (4) hours out of cell time per day, Monday through Friday,' which 'may consist of any of the following or any combination thereof but must include at least one (1) hour of recreation time: table time, recreation time in the recreation pens, out-of-cell programming, and an offender's visitation time Monday through Friday.' 'Legal visits will not be included in the four (4) hours out of cell time. Visitation time that occurs on the weekend shall not be used to reduce the Monday through Friday out of cell time.' Telephone: 'All telephone calls are limited to 25 minutes in duration.' Visits: non-contact per the Phase 1-5 Privileges Chart (Attachment 6); 'This does not apply to attorney visits. Contact visits for attorneys must be approved by the SMU Warden.' Reading: library access 'at least once per week utilizing the mobile book carts.' Mail: 'on the same basis as offenders in the general population.' Tablets: 'All offenders shall have access to the GOAL Devices and Kiosks. Offenders will be allowed to recharge the devices daily and access the Kiosk at least twice a week.'
solitary conditions policy
Johnson State Prison J-1 and J-2 administrative segregation unit holds 72 and 94 offenders Statistic
Johnson State Prison Cycle 3 audit: 'J-1 and J-2 is an administrative segregation unit. J-1 houses 72 offenders. The top range of J-1 has 2 man cells and the lower range houses 2 ADA cells and 4 observation cells. J-2 has 46 2 man cells and 2 single man cells housing 94 offenders. Both units house offenders who are on voluntary or involuntary protective [custody].'
72 offenders in J-1 vs. 94 offenders in J-2
solitary facilities conditions
Tier III requires written notice to a Regional Director when out-of-cell time is cancelled for three days Policy
SOP 209.09, Section IV.E.1.l, Note: 'If out of cell time for an individual wing or the entire SMU is canceled or shortened for three (3) or more consecutive days, then the SMU Warden will promptly notify the North Regional Director in writing and explain the circumstances resulting in the cancellation, the steps taken to resolve the issues resulting in the cancellation, and an estimated timeline for resuming out of cell time.' Second Note in the same subsection: 'Denial of out of cell time as punishment will not be allowed unless the offender has committed a 'Great' or higher severity level disciplinary offense, during out of cell time or during movement to or from out of cell time.' This creates a specific, named, dated written record, held by the SMU Warden and the North Regional Director, of every occasion on which out-of-cell time was cancelled or shortened for three or more consecutive days. It is the only mechanism in the Tier corpus that generates a paper trail of actual out-of-cell denial. No equivalent exists for Tier I, Tier II, or the juvenile program. These notifications are a high-value records target because they would document the gap between the policy floor and practice.
solitary conditions policy
Dooly State Prison J2: 96 inmates in double bunks in administrative segregation, isolation, mental health observations Statistic
Dooly State Prison Cycle 4 audit: 'Building J - Housing unit J2 is designated housing of Administrative Segregation, Isolation and Mental Health Observations. This housing unit will house 96 inmates in double bunks in a cell setting.'
96 inmates in double bunks
solitary facilities conditions mental_health
Tier II STEP conditions permit double occupancy and guarantee four hours out of cell, seven days a week Policy
SOP 209.45, 'Tier II Segregated Transition Education Program (Tier II STEP),' effective 04/25/2019, Authority Commissioner, 12 pages. PowerDMS id 535920. Section IV.C.1: 'a. Cells may be single or double occupancy.' 'b. All cells must be equipped and furnished in a manner consistent with cells in the general population.' 'g. Offenders will be allowed out of their cells in manageable groups.' 'h. Offenders will receive a minimum of four (4) hours out of cell time per day, seven (7) days per week. The four (4) hours out of cell time can cumulative by a combination of recreation, visitation (except visits by the offender's legal team), detail assignment, shower, feeding, Scribe schedule, etc.' 'i. Offenders will be offered a minimum of one (1) hour per day seven (7) days per week for exercise/recreation ... The one (1) hour of exercise/recreation can be included in the out of cell time noted above.' 'n. ... All telephone calls are limited to 15-minutes in duration.' 'p. All visits will be no less than two (2) hours in duration ... and will be non-contact.' 'm. ... Offenders in the STEP Program shall have the same access to the G.O.A.L. Device and the J-Pay Kiosk as that of the general population.' 'u. Offenders will be checked on and documented every thirty (30) minutes.' '2. Privileges available to offenders in the Tier II STEP will be same as general population.' Note on the four-hour figure: SOP 209.45 counts 'shower, feeding ... etc.' toward the four hours, so the four hours are not four hours of association or programming.
solitary conditions policy
Smith State Prison Cycle 4: 192 Tier 1 and 192 Tier 2 offenders in double-bunked dorms Statistic
Smith State Prison Cycle 4, onsite from 2025-02-03: 'This dormitory houses a maximum of 192 Tier 1 offenders (96 on each side)'; 'This dormitory houses a maximum of 192 Tier 2 offenders (96 on each side)'; the dorms comprise '48 double bunked cells housing 96 offenders per dorm.' (The figure is printed as 'I92' and 'I 92' in the extracted text, an optical character recognition rendering of 192, consistent with 96 per side.)
192 Tier 1 offenders per dorm vs. 192 Tier 2 offenders per dorm
solitary facilities conditions tier
Tier III STEP is identical to Tier II STEP except that all cells are single occupancy Finding
SOP 209.55, 'Special Management Unit - Tier III Segregated Transition Education Program (Tier III STEP),' effective 04/25/2019, Authority Commissioner, 12 pages. PowerDMS id 536189. Section IV.C.1 is textually near-identical to SOP 209.45 Section IV.C.1 — same four hours out of cell per day seven days per week, same one hour of exercise, same 15-minute call limit, same two-hour non-contact visits, same general-population privileges, same 30-minute checks — with one substantive difference: Tier III STEP provides 'a. All cells are single occupancy,' where Tier II STEP provides 'a. Cells may be single or double occupancy.' GDC wrote two step-down policies on the same day with the same conditions, and made cell occupancy the one point of divergence. Whether a person in a Georgia step-down unit is held alone or with a cellmate is determined by which Tier they stepped down from.
solitary conditions policy
Hancock State Prison J Building: 20 double-occupancy cells (Cycles 2 and 3), 38 inmates (Cycle 4) Statistic
Hancock State Prison Cycle 2 and Cycle 3: 'J Building - Tier 1/Segregation inmates are housed in double occupancy cells. There are 20 cells in the unit.' Hancock State Prison Cycle 4: '[Building J] This housing unit will house 38 inmates in a combination of single and double cell bunks.'
20 double-occupancy cells vs. 38 inmates in Cycle 4
solitary facilities conditions tier
The tablet is confiscated on Tier II placement until Phase III, and video visits are capped at one a month Policy
SOP 204.10, 'Offender Use of the GOAL Device and J-Pay Kiosk,' effective 09/04/2018, Authority Commissioner. PowerDMS id 187122. Section B, 'Restrictive Housing': 1. 'Any time an offender goes to Isolation/Segregation, the offender's GOAL Device may only be used during times designated by the Warden and may only be used for Education and/or Programming purposes.' 2. 'When an offender is placed in Tier II, the GOAL Device will be confiscated until the offender reaches Tier II - Phase III. When the offender reaches Phase III, the GOAL Device may be used only for Education and/or Programming and only at times designated by the Warden.' 3. 'Offenders in the Tier II—Phase III program and offenders in Isolation/Segregation will only have Video Visitation on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 0900-1500 hours. Offenders in Tier II—Phase III or Isolation/Segregation will only be allowed one (1) Video Visit per calendar month.' A person in Tier II Phase 1 or Phase 2 has no tablet at all. On reaching Phase 3 the tablet returns for education and programming only, and video visitation is limited to one visit per calendar month within a six-hour window on two named weekdays. Compare Tier III (SOP 209.09, effective 6/18/2026), where 'All offenders shall have access to the GOAL Devices and Kiosks,' and both STEP programs, where access equals general population.
solitary conditions policy
Ware State Prison J-Building: 100 Tier 1 offenders double-bunked, 50 per side Statistic
Ware State Prison Cycle 2 and Cycle 3: 'J-Building houses a total of 100, with 50 in each side (J-1 and J-2), Tier 1 offenders, double bunked.'
100 Tier 1 offenders
solitary facilities conditions tier
DOCUMENTED CONFLICT: two GDC SOPs disagree on tablet access and visitation in administrative segregation Methodology note
SOP 209.06 (Administrative Segregation, effective 02/19/2021), Section IV.H.21: 'GOAL Devices: Offenders shall have the same access to GOAL Devices and the J-Pay Kiosk as that of the general population, subject to the legitimate needs of the facility.' SOP 209.06, Section IV.H.9: 'Visitation privileges afforded the general population shall be allowed for offenders in Administrative Segregation (see SOP 227.05, Offender Visitation).' SOP 204.10 (2018) confiscates the GOAL device on Tier II placement until Phase III. SOP 209.08 (2016) limits Tier II visits to one to three non-contact visits per month. SOP 209.08 is titled 'Administrative Segregation - Tier II,' so both the generic policy and the Tier-specific policy claim the field. The corpus does not resolve whether a person in Tier II is entitled to general-population visitation and tablet access under the later generic policy (2021) or restricted to the Tier II regime under the earlier specific policies (2016, 2018). GPS should not assert either reading as settled. This is a genuine conflict in GDC's own rules, and it is recorded as such rather than resolved.
solitary conditions policy
Telfair State Prison Tier I: E-1 houses 80, E-2 houses 70 in two-man cells, up to 30 days Statistic
Telfair State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier I inmates are housed in E-1 and E-2. E-1 houses 80 inmates and E-2 houses 70 inmates in two man cells. These offenders are housed up to 30 days and then released to general population or assigned to Tier II.'
80 inmates in E-1 vs. 70 inmates in E-2
solitary facilities conditions tier
Suicide-risk questioning is monthly in Tier I and weekly in Tier II Policy
SOP 219.01, 'Case Management - Records Maintenance,' effective 11/15/2019, Authority Commissioner, Inmate Services Division. PowerDMS id 106128. Section IV.A.3: 'Offenders housed in the TIER 1 housing unit should be asked questions regarding suicidal thoughts a minimum of once per month. This conversation should be documented in SCRIBE within 24 hours from contact. The documentation should include ways to report and the hotline # 1-800-273-TALK (8255). Offenders housed in TIER II housing unit should be asked questions regarding suicidal thoughts during the weekly rounds.' Tier I placement is capped at 30 days. A monthly suicide-risk question means a person could serve an entire Tier I term and be asked about suicidal ideation exactly once. The unit with the shorter maximum stay carries the less frequent screening requirement. Note also the permissive verb: the SOP says offenders 'should be asked,' not 'shall be asked.'
solitary mental_health policy
Valdosta State Prison Tier 1: double occupancy cells with very limited outside cell activity Finding
Valdosta State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier 1 is the most restrictive program, with offenders typically housed in double occupancy cells with very limited outside cell activity.' The same audit: 'There are two Tier Programs housing recalcitrant offenders who cannot managed in the general population' and 'The Tier Program also houses disciplinary segregation and protective custody.'
solitary conditions facilities tier
GDC's mental-health policy ranks Tier II among its highest-need units and sets a 1:20 counselor ratio Policy
SOP 508.01, 'Mental Health Organization and Administration,' effective 07/27/2023, Authority Commissioner, Health Services Division (Mental Health). PowerDMS id 106264. Section IV.C.1: 'The highest needs are found at Specialized Behavioral Therapeutic Units, Under Death Sentence (UDS), Specialized Management Unit (SMU), Crisis Stabilization Unit/Acute Care Unit (CSU/ACU), Specialized Mental Health Treatment Units (SMHTUs/TIER II, etc.) and Level IV Supportive Living Units. The next priority is Level III Supportive Living Units. The lowest priority is Level II outpatient programs.' Section IV.C.3.c.(5): 'SMHTU/TIER II Ratios: There will be at least 1.0 FTE Mental Health Counselor per 20 offenders at designated SMHTU/TIER II facilities.' Section IV.C.3.j: 'Multifunctional Correctional Officers will be assigned to mental health units with a Supportive Living Unit/SMHTUs/TIER IIs/Integrated Treatment Facilities/Juvenile Units.' GDC's own mental-health policy equates Specialized Mental Health Treatment Units with Tier II, places them in the highest-need tier of its staffing hierarchy alongside death row, the SMU and acute care, and assigns them the second-richest counselor ratio in the system (1:20), behind only crisis stabilization at 1:15. GDC therefore classifies Tier II housing, in its own clinical policy, as one of the most psychiatrically demanding settings it operates. The phrase 'designated SMHTU/TIER II facilities' also confirms, in a 2023 document, that a current list of designated Tier II facilities exists inside GDC.
solitary mental_health policy facilities
Macon State Prison Cycle 3: 48 isolation beds and 48 double occupancy segregation cells Statistic
Macon State Prison Cycle 3: 'One building's unit houses 48 isolation beds and two safe cells and the other unit houses 48 double occupancy cells of segregation beds.'
48 isolation beds vs. 48 double occupancy segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
GDC's mental-health oversight includes a SCRIBE 'Daily lock down' report Policy
SOP 508.01, Section IV.C.5.a: the Mental Health Unit Manager 'will ensure that appropriate staff utilizes the SCRIBE system to include, but not be limited to the following: i. Mental Health caseload summary. ii. Mental Health caseload by counselor. iii. Diagnoses and levels of care. iv. Mental Health staff schedules. v. Treatment plan tickler; and vi. Daily lock down.' GDC names a SCRIBE report called 'Daily lock down' as a routine mental-health oversight instrument. A named, existing, daily electronic report on lockdown status is a records target, and its existence undercuts any claim that per-unit confinement data cannot be produced.
solitary mental_health policy data_gap
Wilcox State Prison segregation cell counts across three cycles: 22+24, 23+72, 168 Statistic
Wilcox State Prison, across three cycles: Cycle 1 'There are 22 isolation cells and 24 double bunked segregation cells'; Cycle 2 'There are 23 isolation cells and 72 double bunked segregation cells'; Cycle 3 'Number of segregation cells ...: 168.'
168 segregation cells (Cycle 3) vs. 95 Cycle 2 total (23 isolation + 72 double-bunked)
solitary facilities conditions
Officer training exists for the SMU / Tier III but not for Tier I or Tier II Finding
SOP 506.08, 'Correctional Training Requirements,' effective 05/27/2020, Executive Division. PowerDMS id 194419. Section G, 'Special Management Unit (SMU)/Tier III Training': '1. The Office of Professional Development shall provide SMU/Tier III training for officers assigned to these units. 2. This program is designed to familiarize employees with concepts and procedures associated with Special Management offenders.' SOP 506.08 contains no corresponding Tier I or Tier II training program. The Tier I and Tier II SOPs instead place the duty on the facility: SOP 209.07, Section VI.I, 'The Warden/Superintendent shall ensure staff is provided a special orientation and training as to the function of the unit ... Specialized departmental training will be developed to support this'; SOP 209.08, Section IV.G.1-2, 'Assignment to duty in the Tier II Program is regarded as hazardous ... the Warden (or Designee) must specifically approve the assignment of uniformed officers, counselors, medical or other staff members to the Tier II Program.' The statewide training SOP creates a centrally delivered curriculum for the single-site Tier III program and none for the multi-site Tier I and Tier II programs, where training is delegated to each Warden. SOP 209.07's promise that 'Specialized departmental training will be developed' is written in the future tense in a policy effective in 2015.
solitary policy staffing
Montgomery State Prison Cycle 2: 8 isolation cells and 8 two-man segregation cells Statistic
Montgomery State Prison Cycle 2: 'an isolation/segregation unit with eight (8) isolation cells and eight (8) two-man segregation cells.'
8 isolation cells vs. 8 two-man segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Lee State Prison Cycle 3: 16 cells with 32 beds Statistic
Lee State Prison Cycle 3 reports 16 cells with 32 beds.
16 cells vs. 32 beds
solitary facilities conditions
Phillips State Prison: 100 isolation/segregation cells in Cycle 3, 75 in Cycle 2 Statistic
Phillips State Prison Cycle 3 reports 'a total of 100 isolation/segregation cells'; Cycle 2 reported 75.
100 isolation/segregation cells vs. 75 Cycle 2 count
solitary facilities conditions
Hancock State Prison segregation cell count: 223 in Cycle 4 and 223 in Cycle 3 Statistic
Hancock State Prison reports 223 segregation cells in Cycle 4, and 223 again in Cycle 3.
223 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison: 409 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison reports 409 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
409 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Smith State Prison: 336 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Smith State Prison reports 336 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
336 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Telfair State Prison: 280 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Telfair State Prison reports 280 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
280 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Hays State Prison: 252 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Hays State Prison reports 252 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
252 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Calhoun State Prison: 197 segregation cells (Cycle 2), medium security Statistic
Calhoun State Prison reports 197 segregation cells in Cycle 2. Its Cycle 2 audit gives its security level as '4/Medium' — more segregation cells than close-security Baldwin (167), Ware (125) or Phillips (75).
197 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Macon State Prison: 192 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Macon State Prison reports 192 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
192 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Coffee Correctional Facility: 170 segregation cells (Cycle 4), private medium-security Statistic
Coffee Correctional Facility, private, reports 170 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
170 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Baldwin State Prison: 167 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Baldwin State Prison reports 167 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
167 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Valdosta State Prison: 161 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Valdosta State Prison reports 161 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
161 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Ware State Prison: 125 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Ware State Prison reports 125 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
125 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Autry State Prison: 95 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Autry State Prison reports 95 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
95 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Rogers State Prison: 95 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Rogers State Prison reports 95 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
95 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Coastal State Prison: 74 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Coastal State Prison reports 74 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
74 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Dooly State Prison: 71 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Dooly State Prison reports 71 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
71 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Dodge State Prison: 50 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Dodge State Prison reports 50 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
50 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Wheeler Correctional Facility: 49 segregation cells (Cycle 4), private Statistic
Wheeler Correctional Facility, private, reports 49 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
49 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Washington State Prison: 48 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Washington State Prison reports 48 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
48 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Rutledge State Prison: 32 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Rutledge State Prison reports 32 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
32 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Montgomery State Prison: 16 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Montgomery State Prison reports 16 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
16 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Georgia State Prison: 12 segregation cells (Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire) Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire reports 12 segregation cells — contradicted by the same audit's narrative itemising 106 Tier I cells at E-South, 218 Tier II beds at G Building and 100 Tier II single lockdown cells at K Building.
12 segregation cells vs. 424 Tier beds stated in same audit narrative
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Burruss Correctional Training Center: 10 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Burruss Correctional Training Center reports 10 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
10 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Emanuel Women's Facility: 7 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Emanuel Women's Facility reports 7 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
7 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Whitworth Women's Facility: 7 segregation cells (Cycle 4) Statistic
Whitworth Women's Facility reports 7 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
7 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
West Central Integrated Treatment Facility: 5 segregation cells (Cycle 4) Statistic
West Central Integrated Treatment Facility reports 5 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
5 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Long Unit: 4 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Long Unit reports 4 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
4 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Pulaski State Prison Cycle 3: 'Number of segregation/isolation units 1' excluded from totals Methodology note
Pulaski Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation units 1,' which is not comparable to a cell count and is excluded from totals.
solitary facilities data_gap
Dodge State Prison Cycle 4: Pod A4 segregation unit for disciplinary and protective custody Finding
Dodge State Prison Cycle 4 describes 'Pod A4 is a segregation unit used to house disciplinary and protective custody inmates.'
solitary facilities conditions
Coastal State Prison Cycle 4: H Building is the closed isolation/segregation unit Finding
Coastal State Prison Cycle 4 describes 'H Building ... the closed, isolation/segregation unit.'
solitary facilities conditions
Rutledge State Prison Cycle 4: Housing Unit G is the administrative segregation unit Finding
Rutledge State Prison Cycle 4 describes 'Housing Unit G ... the administrative segregation unit.'
solitary facilities conditions
Wilcox State Prison described as housing medium security general population inmates Finding
Wilcox State Prison is described in its own audits as 'housing medium security, general population inmates,' yet reports 168 segregation cells in Cycle 3, up from 24 double-bunked in Cycle 1 and 72 in Cycle 2.
solitary facilities demographics
Rogers State Prison security level: Minimum/Medium Finding
Rogers State Prison is described as 'Minimum/Medium' security level and reports 95 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
solitary facilities demographics
Telfair State Prison Cycle 2: isolation/segregation unit of 40 single cells and 40 double-bunked cells Statistic
Telfair State Prison Cycle 2: 'an isolation/segregations unit consisting of 40 single cells and 40 double-bunked cells.'
40 single cells vs. 40 double-bunked cells
solitary facilities conditions
Hays State Prison Tier II F1, F2, G1, G2: 32 one-man cells each Statistic
Hays State Prison Tier II units F1, F2, G1, G2 each have 32 one-man cells. F1 and G1 are described as 'Tier 2 long-term segregation/270 days'; F2 and G2 as 'Tier 2.'
32 one-man cells per unit
solitary facilities conditions tier
Hays State Prison Tier I D2 and E: 64 two-man cells each Statistic
Hays State Prison Tier I units: (D2) 2-man cells with capacity of 64 inmates (Tier 1) Protective Custody/two officers assigned 24/7; E Unit/two dorms (Tier 1 short-term segregation/30 days) with capacity of 64/two officers 24/7.
64 inmates per Tier I unit
solitary facilities conditions tier
Hays State Prison H1 and H2 Tier 2 Stepdown Units: 47 one-man cells Statistic
Hays State Prison H Unit with two dorms, one-man and two-man cells that house a maximum of 47 inmates, H1 (Tier 2 Stepdown Unit) H2 (Tier 2 Stepdown Unit) one-man cells with 47 inmates. This is the only audit in the corpus that names a step-down unit by name.
47 one-man cells
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison E-South: 106 double-bunk isolation/segregation/Tier I cells Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'E - North houses 104 offenders in single bunk cells and the South side houses 106 in double bunk isolation/segregation/Tier I Cells.'
106 double-bunk Tier I cells vs. 104 single bunk cells E-North
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison G Building: 218 Tier II offenders in double bunk cells Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier II Housing Unit (G Building) houses up to 218 offenders in double bunk cells.'
218 Tier II offenders
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison K Building: 100 Tier II inmates in single cell lockdown cells Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier II (K Building) - Houses 100 inmates in single cell lockdown cells.'
100 Tier II inmates in single cell lockdown
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison D East: 49 Tier II Mental Health Offenders Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'D East houses 49 Tier II Mental Health Offenders.'
49 Tier II Mental Health Offenders
solitary facilities conditions mental_health tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 1: 17 general population dorms and 13 Tier Program dorms Statistic
Georgia State Prison, PREA Audit Cycle 1, onsite 2016-05-10 to 11: the prison comprised '17 general population dorms and 13 Tier Program dorms.'
13 Tier Program dorms vs. 17 general population dorms
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: Tier II progression may take up to two years Finding
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier II is the most restrictive and offenders in this program may take up to two years to progress ... through the required phases to enable them to return to the general population.' This duration has no basis in SOP 209.08.
solitary policy facilities tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: Tier II requires minimum one officer per dorm 24/7 Policy
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'Tier II houses the most problematic offenders and requires a minimum of one officer per dorm 24/7.'
solitary staffing facilities tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: Tier I and II offenders spend good portion of sentences in segregation Finding
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'The facility houses a large population of Tier I and Tier II offenders. These inmates are recalcitrant and spend a good portion of their sentences in segregation.'
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 26-bed surgical unit and Crisis Stabilization Unit Finding
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: 'Cell blocks are organized into a general population unit, special management units (tier programs, I and II) housing an extremely difficult population, Mental Health Units, an emergency room, infirmary including a Crisis Stabilization Unit in addition to infirmary beds and a 26-bed surgical unit.'
medical mental_health facilities tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 population: 379 Close Security, 768 Medium, 087 Minimum Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 gives the population as '379 Close Security, 768 Medium, 087 Minimum.'
379 Close Security inmates vs. 768 Medium Security inmates
demographics facilities
Georgia State Prison closed 2022-02-19 Case detail
Georgia State Prison closed 2022-02-19, so the Tier figures from its audits are historical.
facilities operations
Special Management Unit stated capacity: 192 single-bunked Statistic
The Special Management Unit has a stated capacity of 192 single-bunked. Its published monthly population has ranged from 149 to 195.
192 single-bunked capacity vs. 195 maximum published monthly population
solitary facilities conditions tier
Tier programme designation appears only at close-security prisons without exception Finding
The Tier programme designation appears only at close-security prisons, without exception. But segregation and administrative-segregation housing is documented at medium-security prisons throughout the system.
solitary facilities demographics tier
Tier II is administrative segregation; audits use the two terms interchangeably Finding
Tier II is administrative segregation, and the audits use the two terms interchangeably. This is established on GDC's own authority via the quoted Fact Sheet.
solitary policy facilities tier
Refusal to participate in Tier I is a ground for escalation to Tier II Policy
Refusal to participate in Tier I is itself a ground for escalation to Tier II, per the GDC Fact Sheet quoted in PREA audits (criterion 5: 'Failure in Tier I or refused to participate').
solitary policy tier
Transfer from Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison is standalone eligibility ground for Tier II Policy
Transfer from Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison is a standalone eligibility ground for long-term administrative segregation, per criterion 11 of the GDC Fact Sheet quoted in PREA audits.
solitary policy transfers tier
Smith Cycle 2: classification committee reviews Tier I and II offenders every 30 days Policy
The Smith Cycle 2 audit adds: 'The classification committee reviews the status of Tier I and II offenders once every 30 days. There is an appeal process according to the fact sheet.'
solitary policy tier
Administrative segregation hearing held within 96 hours of classification committee recommendation Policy
Per the GDC Fact Sheet quoted in PREA audits: 'The classification committee will review all recommendations for assignments and submit recommendations based on eligibility criteria. The committee will hold an Administrative Segregation hearing within 96 hours. The offender, in this program, may progress through Phase 1, II and III.'
solitary policy legal tier
Tier I described as Disciplinary, Protective Custody and Transient Housing with eight placement grounds Policy
Per the GDC Fact Sheet quoted in PREA audits, Tier I is 'the Disciplinary, Protective Custody and Transient Housing' with eight placement grounds.
solitary policy tier
Tier II described as Administrative Segregation with twelve eligibility criteria Policy
Per the GDC Fact Sheet quoted in PREA audits, Tier II is 'Administrative Segregation' with twelve eligibility criteria.
solitary policy tier
Tier III program consists of five phases per GDCP Cycle 3 audit Policy
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison Cycle 3 audit states: 'The Tier III program consists of five phases (level five being the most restrictive) based on an increased level of privileges for demonstrated appropriate offender behavior and program compliance.'
solitary policy tier
Hays State Prison Cycle 2: Tier I short-term segregation 30 days, Tier II long-term 270 days Policy
Hays State Prison Cycle 2 audit describes Tier I as 'short-term segregation/30 days' and Tier II as 'long-term segregation/270 days.' The 270-day figure appears nowhere in SOP 209.08.
solitary policy facilities tier
Telfair State Prison Cycle 2: Tier I offenders housed up to 30 days then released or assigned to Tier II Policy
Telfair State Prison Cycle 2: 'These offenders are housed up to 30 days and then released to general population or assigned to Tier II.'
solitary policy facilities tier
Macon State Prison Cycle 2: Tier II from nine months to indefinite Policy
Macon State Prison Cycle 2 audit describes Tier II as running 'from nine months to indefinite.'
solitary policy facilities tier
Macon State Prison Cycle 4: Tier II from 270 days to indefinite date Policy
Macon State Prison Cycle 4 audit describes Tier II as running 'from 270 days to an indefinite date.'
solitary policy facilities tier
Hancock Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire says 320 segregation cells vs narrative 20 cells Methodology note
Hancock Cycle 2's Pre-Audit Questionnaire says 320 segregation cells while its narrative says 'J Building - Tier 1/Segregation ... There are 20 cells in the unit.'
solitary facilities data_gap
Washington Cycle 3: 'Number of segregation/isolation units 48' label defect Methodology note
Washington Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation units 48' where 48 is implausible as housing units at a prison the same table credits with 13.
solitary facilities data_gap
Dooly Cycle 3: 'Number of segregation/isolation 71' with noun missing Methodology note
Dooly Cycle 3 reads 'Number of segregation/isolation 71' with the noun missing entirely.
solitary facilities data_gap
Telfair Cycle 2 questionnaire says 280 vs narrative 40 single + 40 double-bunked cells Methodology note
Telfair Cycle 2's questionnaire says 280 segregation cells while its narrative describes an isolation and segregation unit of '40 single cells and 40 double-bunked cells.'
solitary facilities data_gap
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 questionnaire says 12 segregation cells vs narrative 424 Tier beds Methodology note
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2's questionnaire says 12 segregation cells while its narrative itemises 106 Tier I cells at E-South, 218 Tier II beds at G Building and 100 Tier II single lockdown cells at K Building.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Cycle 2 audits report segregation cells in structured Pre-Audit Questionnaire 'Physical Plant' block Methodology note
Cycle 2 audits report segregation cell counts in a structured Pre-Audit Questionnaire 'Physical Plant' block headed 'Number of Segregation Cells (Administrative and Disciplinary)'; cycles 3 and 4 use variant labels; cycles 1, 4 and 5 are often narrative only.
solitary facilities data_gap
System-wide segregation total: 3,182 cells across 28 state-operated facilities Statistic
Restricting the system-wide segregation cell total to state-operated facilities gives 3,182 across 28 facilities.
3,182 segregation cells vs. 3,401 all facilities including private
solitary facilities demographics
Single-cycle Cycle 2 state facility segregation total: 2,967 across 23 facilities Statistic
On a single-cycle basis, the 23 state facilities with a structured Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire figure total 2,967 segregation cells.
2,967 segregation cells
solitary facilities demographics
Cycle 2 total rises to 3,078 across 25 facilities when Wilcox and Montgomery added from narrative Statistic
The Cycle 2 state facility total rises to 3,078 across 25 when Wilcox (23 isolation plus 72 double-bunked segregation) and Montgomery (8 isolation plus 8 two-man segregation) are added from narrative.
3,078 segregation cells vs. 2,967 structured questionnaire only
solitary facilities demographics
Tier units are a subset of all segregation cells counted in the 3,401 figure Methodology note
The 3,401 segregation cell figure counts all segregation, not only Tier programme housing. Tier units are a subset.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Segregation cell figures span Cycle 2 (2017-2019), Cycle 3 (2019-2021), Cycle 4 (2021-2025) Methodology note
The segregation cell figures span Cycle 2 (2017 to 2019), Cycle 3 (2019 to 2021) and Cycle 4 (2021 to 2025).
solitary facilities data_gap
Documented segregation unit capacities run from 20 to 218 per unit; no standard Tier dorm size Finding
The documented capacities run from 20 to 218 per unit; there is no standard Tier dorm size.
solitary facilities conditions tier
Whether Tier confinement is solitary depends on unit assignment, not policy Finding
Whether a person in Georgia's Tier system is held alone or with a cellmate, and therefore whether a 23-hour-a-day confinement is solitary confinement within the Mandela Rules definition or not, is determined by which unit they are assigned to — and GDC's Tier II policy neither specifies nor reports it.
solitary policy conditions tier
Every state prison in corpus that reports a number reports segregation cells, close or medium security Finding
Every state prison in the corpus that reports a number reports segregation cells, close security or medium. Any account of Georgia's use of isolation that follows only the Tier designation will miss the majority of the facilities that operate segregation housing, including a medium-security prison with a 96-person double-bunked administrative segregation unit.
solitary facilities demographics tier
Tier label marks where GDC concentrates long-term administrative segregation programming, not where segregation cells exist Finding
The Tier label marks where GDC concentrates long-term administrative segregation programming. It does not mark where segregation cells exist.
solitary facilities policy tier
PREA corpus is best per-facility segregation dataset GDC publishes but internally inconsistent Methodology note
The PREA corpus is the best per-facility segregation dataset GDC publishes, and it is internally inconsistent. Any published GPS figure drawn from it must name the facility, the cycle and the field, and must not silently reconcile a questionnaire figure against a narrative one.
solitary facilities data_gap
273 GDC-published PREA facility audit reports analyzed across Cycles 1-5 Methodology note
All 273 GDC-published PREA facility audit reports (cycles 1 to 5) held in the GPS index of GDC's Research and Reports publications were scanned for programme-sense Tier language and for segregation-housing counts. Each figure is attributed to the audit that states it, with the gdc.georgia.gov URL.
solitary facilities data_gap
Boilerplate 'Tier Program' PREA education sentence appears in roughly 60 audits Methodology note
A single sentence of GDC policy boilerplate about delayed PREA education appears in roughly 60 audits, including audits of transitional centres, probation detention centres and county correctional institutions that demonstrably have no Tier housing. A naive keyword search for 'Tier Program' across the PREA corpus produces a badly inflated facility list for this reason.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Architectural 'tier' usage excluded: Hancock, Georgia State, Telfair, Smith, Pulaski examples Methodology note
Phrases such as 'two tiers of two-man cells' (Hancock Cycle 4), 'four two-tiered cellblocks' (Georgia State Prison), 'an upper and lower tier' (Telfair, Smith) and 'This is a 2 Tier dorm that houses 30 inmates on the top tier and twenty-eight (28) on the bottom tier' (Pulaski Cycles 2 and 3) are architectural and are excluded throughout.
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Pulaski Cycle 2 and 3: 2 Tier dorm houses 30 top tier and 28 bottom tier (architectural, excluded) Methodology note
Pulaski Cycles 2 and 3: 'This is a 2 Tier dorm that houses 30 inmates on the top tier and twenty-eight (28) on the bottom tier' — architectural usage, excluded from Tier programme analysis.
facilities data_gap tier
Hancock Cycle 4: 'two tiers of two-man cells' architectural usage excluded Methodology note
Hancock Cycle 4 uses 'two tiers of two-man cells' — architectural usage, excluded from Tier programme analysis.
facilities data_gap tier
Georgia State Prison: 'four two-tiered cellblocks' architectural usage excluded Methodology note
Georgia State Prison uses 'four two-tiered cellblocks' — architectural usage, excluded from Tier programme analysis.
facilities data_gap tier
Telfair and Smith: 'an upper and lower tier' architectural usage excluded Methodology note
Telfair and Smith audits use 'an upper and lower tier' — architectural usage, excluded from Tier programme analysis.
facilities data_gap tier
Hays State Prison Cycle 2: Tier I and II segregation units utilized for Protective Custody and problematic offenders Finding
Hays State Prison Cycle 2: 'This is a Tier I & II facility. ... Tier I and II segregation units are utilized for Protective Custody and problematic offenders. ... Hays is comprised of three units to include the main compound (G.P.), Tier 1, and Tier II. Tier I (short term segregation) consist of E building and D-2. TIER II (long term segregation) consists of F, G, and H building.'
solitary facilities conditions tier
Hays State Prison Tier I units are two-man cells; Tier II units are one-man cells Finding
The Hays State Prison Cycle 2 audit documents the occupancy split: Tier I units at Hays are two-man cells, and Tier II units are one-man cells.
solitary facilities conditions tier
Hays State Prison Tier units held 303 stated capacity — larger than entire Tier III Special Management Unit Finding
One close-security prison's Tier units held a stated capacity of 303 — larger than the entire Tier III Special Management Unit, whose published monthly population has ranged from 149 to 195.
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison 424 Tier beds more than twice Special Management Unit's 192 Finding
Georgia State Prison's 424 stated Tier beds is more than twice the Special Management Unit's 192.
solitary facilities conditions tier
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2: Tier II at G Building double-bunked while K Building single-cell lockdown Finding
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 documents both occupancy modes side by side in the same programme: Tier I cells at E-South are double-bunked, Tier II at G Building is double-bunked, and Tier II at K Building is 'single cell lockdown cells.'
solitary facilities conditions tier
Smith State Prison Cycle 4: 48 double-bunked cells housing 96 offenders per dorm Statistic
Smith State Prison Cycle 4: the dorms comprise '48 double bunked cells housing 96 offenders per dorm.' This is the clearest case of the structural pattern: a unit of a given number of cells holds that number of people when single-bunked and twice that number when double-bunked.
48 double-bunked cells per dorm vs. 96 offenders per dorm
solitary facilities conditions tier
Hays State Prison arithmetic: Tier II one-man dorms at 32, Tier I two-man dorms at 64 Finding
Hays State Prison shows the same arithmetic across unit types: Tier II one-man dorms at 32, Tier I two-man dorms at 64.
solitary facilities conditions tier
Double-bunked segregation and Tier housing are ordinary described condition at most Georgia facilities Finding
Double-bunked segregation and double-bunked Tier housing are not exceptional in Georgia; they are the ordinary described condition at most of the facilities that describe the condition at all. This is the facility-level counterpart to the policy finding that SOP 209.08 imposes no single-occupancy requirement for Tier II and SOP 209.06 treats single-celling in administrative segregation as an enumerated exception.
solitary conditions facilities tier
Two occupancy modes run inside same programme at same prison: Georgia State and Hays examples Finding
The two occupancy modes run inside the same programme at the same prison: at Georgia State Prison, Tier II at G Building was double-bunked while Tier II at K Building was single-cell lockdown; at Hays, Tier I was two-man cells while Tier II was one-man cells.
solitary conditions facilities tier
Calhoun State Prison Cycle 2 security level: 4/Medium Finding
Calhoun State Prison's Cycle 2 audit gives its security level as '4/Medium' and reports 197 segregation cells — more than close-security Baldwin (167), Ware (125) or Phillips (75).
solitary facilities demographics
Autry State Prison Cycle 3: segregation unit with 86 beds and 47 beds for isolation and protective custody Statistic
Autry State Prison Cycle 3 audit describes 'a segregation unit with 86 beds and 47 beds for isolation and protective custody.'
86 segregation beds vs. 47 isolation and protective custody beds
solitary facilities conditions
Dooly State Prison Cycle 4: J2 designated for Administrative Segregation, Isolation and Mental Health Observations Finding
Dooly State Prison Cycle 4 audit describes housing unit J2 as 'designated housing of Administrative Segregation, Isolation and Mental Health Observations ... 96 inmates in double bunks in a cell setting.'
solitary facilities conditions mental_health
Johnson State Prison J-1 and J-2 are administrative segregation unit holding 72 and 94 offenders Finding
Johnson State Prison's J-1 and J-2 are 'an administrative segregation unit' holding 72 and 94 offenders respectively.
solitary facilities conditions
Dodge State Prison Cycle 4: Pod A4 segregation unit for disciplinary and protective custody Finding
Dodge State Prison Cycle 4 describes 'Pod A4 is a segregation unit used to house disciplinary and protective custody inmates.'
solitary facilities conditions
Coastal State Prison Cycle 4: H Building is the closed isolation/segregation unit Finding
Coastal State Prison Cycle 4 describes 'H Building ... the closed, isolation/segregation unit.'
solitary facilities conditions
Rutledge State Prison Cycle 4: Housing Unit G is the administrative segregation unit Finding
Rutledge State Prison Cycle 4 describes 'Housing Unit G ... the administrative segregation unit.'
solitary facilities conditions
Wilcox State Prison Cycle 1: 22 isolation cells and 24 double-bunked segregation cells Statistic
Wilcox State Prison Cycle 1: 'There are 22 isolation cells and 24 double bunked segregation cells.'
22 isolation cells vs. 24 double-bunked segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Wilcox State Prison Cycle 2: 23 isolation cells and 72 double-bunked segregation cells Statistic
Wilcox State Prison Cycle 2: 'There are 23 isolation cells and 72 double bunked segregation cells.'
23 isolation cells vs. 72 double-bunked segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Wilcox State Prison Cycle 3: 168 segregation cells Statistic
Wilcox State Prison Cycle 3: 'Number of segregation cells ...: 168.'
168 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Montgomery State Prison Cycle 2: 8 isolation cells and 8 two-man segregation cells Statistic
Montgomery State Prison Cycle 2: 'an isolation/segregation unit with eight (8) isolation cells and eight (8) two-man segregation cells.'
8 isolation cells vs. 8 two-man segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Lee State Prison Cycle 3: 16 cells with 32 beds Statistic
Lee State Prison Cycle 3 reports 16 cells with 32 beds.
16 cells vs. 32 beds
solitary facilities conditions
Phillips State Prison Cycle 3: 100 isolation/segregation cells; Cycle 2: 75 Statistic
Phillips State Prison Cycle 3 reports 'a total of 100 isolation/segregation cells'; Cycle 2 reported 75.
100 isolation/segregation cells vs. 75 Cycle 2 count
solitary facilities conditions
Hancock State Prison Cycle 4 and Cycle 3: 223 segregation cells each Statistic
Hancock State Prison reports 223 segregation cells in Cycle 4, and 223 again in Cycle 3.
223 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison: 409 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison reports 409 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
409 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Smith State Prison: 336 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Smith State Prison reports 336 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
336 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Telfair State Prison: 280 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Telfair State Prison reports 280 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
280 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Hays State Prison: 252 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Hays State Prison reports 252 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
252 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Calhoun State Prison: 197 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Calhoun State Prison reports 197 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
197 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Macon State Prison: 192 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Macon State Prison reports 192 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
192 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Coffee Correctional Facility: 170 segregation cells (Cycle 4) Statistic
Coffee Correctional Facility, private, reports 170 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
170 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Baldwin State Prison: 167 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Baldwin State Prison reports 167 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
167 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Valdosta State Prison: 161 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Valdosta State Prison reports 161 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
161 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Ware State Prison: 125 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Ware State Prison reports 125 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
125 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Autry State Prison: 95 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Autry State Prison reports 95 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
95 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Rogers State Prison: 95 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Rogers State Prison reports 95 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
95 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Coastal State Prison: 74 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Coastal State Prison reports 74 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
74 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Dooly State Prison: 71 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Dooly State Prison reports 71 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
71 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Dodge State Prison: 50 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Dodge State Prison reports 50 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
50 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Wheeler Correctional Facility: 49 segregation cells (Cycle 4) Statistic
Wheeler Correctional Facility, private, reports 49 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
49 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Washington State Prison: 48 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Washington State Prison reports 48 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
48 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Rutledge State Prison: 32 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Rutledge State Prison reports 32 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
32 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Montgomery State Prison: 16 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Montgomery State Prison reports 16 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
16 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Georgia State Prison: 12 segregation cells (Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire) Statistic
Georgia State Prison Cycle 2 Pre-Audit Questionnaire reports 12 segregation cells — contradicted by the same audit's narrative itemising 106 Tier I cells at E-South, 218 Tier II beds at G Building and 100 Tier II single lockdown cells at K Building.
12 segregation cells vs. 424 Tier beds stated in same audit narrative
solitary facilities data_gap tier
Burruss Correctional Training Center: 10 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Burruss Correctional Training Center reports 10 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
10 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Emanuel Women's Facility: 7 segregation cells (Cycle 3) Statistic
Emanuel Women's Facility reports 7 segregation cells in Cycle 3.
7 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Whitworth Women's Facility: 7 segregation cells (Cycle 4) Statistic
Whitworth Women's Facility reports 7 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
7 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
West Central Integrated Treatment Facility: 5 segregation cells (Cycle 4) Statistic
West Central Integrated Treatment Facility reports 5 segregation cells in Cycle 4.
5 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions
Long Unit: 4 segregation cells (Cycle 2) Statistic
Long Unit reports 4 segregation cells in Cycle 2.
4 segregation cells
solitary facilities conditions

Sources

177 cited sources backing this research.

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ACA Performance-Based Standards and Expected Practices for Adult Correctional Institutions, 5th edition
— American Correctional Association (Jan 1, 2021)
Primary Legislation
Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-1-.03
— Georgia Board of Corrections
Primary Legislation
Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-2-.10
— Georgia Board of Corrections
Primary Legal document
Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-2-.10(f)
— Georgia Board of Corrections
Primary Legislation
Board of Corrections Rule 125-4-4-.08
— Georgia Board of Corrections
Primary Legal document
Craig Haney expert report in Gumm v. Ford
Dr. Craig Haney — Gumm v. Ford litigation record (Jan 1, 2017)
Primary Official report
DOJ CRIPA investigation expansion April 2024
— United States Department of Justice (Apr 1, 2024)
Primary Official report
DOJ findings letter 1 October 2024
— United States Department of Justice (Oct 1, 2024)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2014
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2014)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2017
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2017)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2018
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2018)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2019
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2019)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2020
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2020)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2023
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2023)
Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2024
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Primary Official report
GDC Annual Fiscal Report 2025
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
GDC executions and detainers
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
GDC FY2017 Annual Fiscal Report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Data portal
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
GDC PREA Annual Reports 2014-2024
Georgia Department of Corrections — Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Data portal
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Primary Official report
GDC PREA facility audit reports (273 documents)
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
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Primary Official report
GDC Release by County
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Primary Official report
GDC SOP 209.07
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC SOP 209.08
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC SOP 209.45
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC SOP 209.55
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC SOP 508.01
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2023)
Primary Official report
GDC SOP corpus
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC Three-Year Reconviction
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Primary Official report
GDC Tier Segregation System Fact Sheet (2018, 2019)
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Primary Official report
GDC Truth in Sentencing
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Primary Official report
GDC Year-End Population since 1925
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Autry - Audit (Cycle 3)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Baldwin SP - Audit (Cycle 4)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Coffee CF - Audit (Cycle 4)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA GDCP - Audit (Cycle 2)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Hancock - Audit (Cycle 2)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Hays - Audit (Cycle 1)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Lee - Audit (Cycle 2)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Lee - Audit (Cycle 3)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Montgomery - Audit (Cycle 2)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Phillips SP - Audit (Cycle 2)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Riverbend - Audit (Cycle 4)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Smith SP - Audit (Cycle 1)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Smith SP - Audit (Cycle 3)
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Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Telfair SP - Audit (Cycle 4)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Valdosta SP - Audit (Cycle 4)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Ware - Audit (Cycle 2)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Ware - Audit (Cycle 3)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Wheeler CF - Audit (Cycle 4)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Wilcox - Audit (Cycle 1)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Wilcox - Audit (Cycle 2)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
GDC, PREA Wilcox - Audit (Cycle 3)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Data portal
Georgia Department of Administrative Services Risk Management dataset (2026-OPN-00310)
— Georgia Department of Administrative Services
Primary Official report
Georgia Department of Corrections restrictive-housing and segregation SOPs — series 204, 206, 208, 209, 211, 212, 227, 507 and 508 (21 SOPs)
Georgia Department of Corrections — Georgia Department of Corrections
Secondary Official report
Georgia Department of Corrections restrictive-housing and segregation SOPs — series 204, 206, 208, 209, 211, 212, 227, 507 and 508 (GPS curated policy-library topic 8)
Georgia Department of Corrections — Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
Georgia Department of Corrections, "Close Security Facility Fact Sheet"
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
Georgia Department of Corrections, "Tier Segregation System Fact Sheet" (2018), archived at Digital Library of Georgia
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2018)
Primary Official report
Georgia Department of Corrections, "Tier Segregation System Fact Sheet" (2019), archived at Digital Library of Georgia
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2019)
Primary Official report
Georgia Department of Corrections, "Tier Segregation System" informational highlights fact sheet (current version), produced in open-records request R031710-091426 on 2026-10-05
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
Georgia State Prison conditions lawsuit, SCHR
— Southern Center for Human Rights (Sep 1, 2021)
Primary Gps original
Georgia's Tier Segregation System, Part 3: The Retaliation Question, Litigation Scope, and Standards
— Georgia Prisoners' Speak
Secondary Gps original
GPS facility registry — derived from Georgia Department of Corrections facility data
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak (Jan 1, 2026)
Primary Gps original
GPS facility registry — derived from Georgia Department of Corrections facility data
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak (Jan 1, 2026)
Primary Gps original
GPS open-records archive — agency productions received by GPS on its own open-records requests
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak
Secondary Gps original
GPS post 12153, 'The Punishment for Speaking Up in Georgia's Prisons'
— Georgia Prisoners' Speak
Secondary Gps original
GPS post 3979, 'Georgia Prisons' ACA Compliance vs. Inhumane Reality'
— Georgia Prisoners' Speak
Secondary Gps original
GPS post 4508, 'Invisible Scars: Cycle of Retaliation and Abuse in Georgia Prisons'
— Georgia Prisoners' Speak
Primary Gps original
GPS Quote Bank — mechanically verified quotes located in GPS-held source documents
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak
Secondary Gps original
GPS Quote Bank entries 3627 and 3628, attributed as recorded in the Quote Bank
Jacs — Georgia Prisoners' Speak (Jan 1, 2026)
Primary Legal document
Gumm v. Ford, Doc. 484, U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia, April 19, 2024
Judge Marc T. Treadwell — U.S. District Court, Middle District of Georgia (Apr 19, 2024)
Primary Legal document
Gumm v. Ford, No. 5:15-cv-00041-MTT-CHW (M.D. Ga.)
— United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia
Primary Legislation
O.C.G.A. § 42-5-36(c)
— Georgia General Assembly
Primary Legislation
O.C.G.A. § 50-18-71(f)
— Georgia General Assembly
Primary Gps original
Open-records production to GPS — DOAS Risk Management request 2026-OPN-00310
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak (Jan 1, 2026)
Primary Gps original
Open-records production to GPS — GDC request R024615-101925 (filed 19 October 2025)
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak (Oct 19, 2025)
Primary Gps original
Open-records production to GPS — GDC request R031471-090226 (filed 2 September 2026)
Georgia Prisoners' Speak — Georgia Prisoners' Speak (Sep 2, 2026)
Primary Official report
PREA audits
— U.S. Department of Justice / Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Augusta State Medical Prison Audit Cycle 1
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Autry State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Baldwin State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Burruss Correctional Training Center Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Calhoun State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Central State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Coastal State Prison Audit Cycle 1
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Coastal State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Coastal State Prison Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Dodge State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Dodge State Prison Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Dooly Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Dooly State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Emanuel Women's Facility Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Emanuel Women's Facility Audit Cycle 5
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Georgia SP Audit Cycle 1
— Georgia Department of Corrections (May 10, 2016)
Primary Official report
PREA Georgia SP Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Mar 22, 2019)
Primary Official report
PREA Georgia State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Mar 22, 2019)
Primary Official report
PREA Hancock Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Hancock SP Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Hays Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jun 15, 2019)
Primary Official report
PREA Johnson Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Long Unit Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Macon Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Macon State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Metro Reentry Facility Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Montgomery State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Montgomery State Prison Audit Cycle 5
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Phillips State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Pulaski State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Pulaski State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Pulaski State Prison Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Rogers State Prison Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Rogers State Prison Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Rutledge State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Rutledge State Prison Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Smith SP Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Smith SP Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Feb 3, 2025)
Primary Official report
PREA Telfair Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Valdosta SP Audit Cycle 2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Washington State Prison Audit Cycle 3
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA West Central Integrated Treatment Facility Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
PREA Whitworth Women's Facility Audit Cycle 4
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
Sandin v. Conner
— Supreme Court of the United States
Primary Official report
SOP 204.10: Offender Use of the GOAL Device and J-Pay Kiosk
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2018)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.01
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.01: Offender Discipline
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Nov 6, 2017)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.03
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.05, Stripped Cells and Temporary Confiscation of Personal Property
Bryson/Jacobs — Georgia Department of Corrections (Apr 30, 2015)
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.06
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.06: Administrative Segregation
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2021)
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.07
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.07, Segregation - Tier I: Disciplinary, Protective Custody and Transient Housing
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2015)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.07: Segregation - Tier I: Disciplinary, Protective Custody and Transient Housing
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2015)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.07: Tier I
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.07: Tier I Program
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.08
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.08, Section III.C
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.08, Section IV.D.1.d
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.08, Section IV.L.1-2
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.08: Administrative Segregation - Tier II
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2016)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.08: Tier II
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Apr 11, 2016)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.08: Tier II Program
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.09: Special Management Unit - Tier III Program (effective 6/18/2026)
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jun 18, 2026)
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.11, Section IV.E.1.d
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.11: Restrictive Housing Assignment - Juvenile Offender Administrative Segregation (RHA-JOAS)
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2016)
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.45
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.45: Tier II Segregated Transition Education Program (Tier II STEP)
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2019)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.45: Tier II STEP
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 209.55
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 209.55: Special Management Unit - Tier III Segregated Transition Education Program (Tier III STEP)
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2019)
Primary Official report
SOP 209.55: Tier III STEP
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 219.01: Case Management - Records Maintenance
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2019)
Primary Official report
SOP 219.01: Offender Records
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Legal document
SOP 220.09
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 227.02 official copy, Georgia Department of Corrections (PowerDMS)
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 506.08: Correctional Training Requirements
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2020)
Primary Legal document
SOP 507.04.04
— Georgia Department of Corrections
Primary Official report
SOP 507.04.33: Health Evaluation of Offenders in Restrictive Housing
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 31, 2022)
Primary Official report
SOP 508.01: Mental Health Organization and Administration
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Jan 1, 2023)
Primary Legal document
SOP 508.20
— Georgia Department of Corrections (Aug 2, 2022)
Primary Legislation
UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (Nelson Mandela Rules)
— United Nations General Assembly (Dec 17, 2015)
Primary Official report
United States Department of Justice CRIPA investigation findings letter
— United States Department of Justice (Jan 1, 2024)
Primary Legal document
Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209 (2005)
— Supreme Court of the United States (Jan 1, 2005)

Key Entities

Organizations, people, facilities, and other named entities referenced in this research.

Administrative Segregation [program]
American Correctional Association [organization]
Arrendale State Prison [facility]
Augusta State Medical Prison [facility]
Autry State Prison [facility]
Baldwin State Prison [facility]
Board of Corrections [organization]
Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-1-.03 [legislation]
Board of Corrections Rule 125-3-2-.10 [legislation]
Board of Corrections Rule 125-4-4-.08 [legislation]
Burruss Correctional Training Center [facility]
Calhoun State Prison [facility]
Central State Prison [facility]
Coastal State Prison [facility]
Coffee Correctional Facility [facility]
Craig Haney [person]
Department of Justice [organization]
DOAS [organization]
Dodge State Prison [facility]
Dooly State Prison [facility]
Emanuel Unit [facility]
Emanuel Women's Facility [facility]
GDC FY2014 Annual Fiscal Report [case]
GDCP High Max Unit [facility]
GDCP SMU [facility]
Georgia Department of Corrections [organization]
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison [facility]
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison [facility]
Georgia Prisoners' Speak [organization]
Georgia State Prison [facility]
GPS Curated Topic: Restrictive Housing and Segregation in Georgia Department of Corrections [program]
Gumm v. Ford [case]
Hancock State Prison [facility]
Hays State Prison [facility]
Helms Facility [facility]
Jacs [person]
Johnson State Prison [facility]
Lee State Prison [facility]
Long Unit [facility]
Macon State Prison [facility]
Marc T. Treadwell [person]
McRae Women's Facility [facility]
Metro Reentry Facility [facility]
Montgomery State Prison [facility]
Nelson Mandela Rules [legislation]
O.C.G.A. § 42-5-36(c) [legislation]
Offenders Under Transition [program]
Phillips State Prison [facility]
Prison Rape Elimination Act [legislation]
Pulaski State Prison [facility]
RHA-JOAS [program]
Riverbend Correctional Facility [facility]
Rogers State Prison [facility]
Rutledge State Prison [facility]
Sandin v. Conner [case]
Sarah Geraghty [person]
SCRIBE [program]
Smith State Prison [facility]
SOP 209.01 [organization]
SOP 209.01: Offender Discipline [legislation]
SOP 209.03 [legislation]
SOP 209.05 [legislation]
SOP 209.06 [organization]
SOP 209.06: Administrative Segregation [legislation]
SOP 209.07: Tier I [legislation]
SOP 209.07: Tier I Program [legislation]
SOP 209.08 [legislation]
SOP 209.08: Tier II [legislation]
SOP 209.08: Tier II Program [legislation]
SOP 209.09: Tier III [legislation]
SOP 209.09: Tier III Program [legislation]
SOP 209.11 [legislation]
SOP 209.45 [legislation]
SOP 209.45: Tier II STEP [legislation]
SOP 209.55 [legislation]
SOP 209.55: Tier III STEP [legislation]
SOP 219.01: Offender Records [legislation]
SOP 227.02: Statewide Grievance Procedure [legislation]
SOP 507.04.33 [legislation]
SOP VG67-0001 [legislation]
Southern Center for Human Rights [organization]
Special Management Unit [facility]
Telfair State Prison [facility]
Tier I [program]
Tier I Program [program]
Tier II [program]
Tier II Program [program]
Tier II STEP [program]
Tier III [program]
Tier III Program [program]
Tier III STEP [program]
Tier Segregation Management System [program]
Tier Segregation Manager [person]
Tier Segregation System [program]
Timothy Gumm [person]
UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (Nelson Mandela Rules) [legislation]
Walker State Prison [facility]
Ware State Prison [facility]
West Central Integrated Treatment Facility [facility]
Wheeler Correctional Facility [facility]
Whitworth Women's Facility [facility]
Wilcox State Prison [facility]
Wilkinson v. Austin [case]
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