Cruel and Unusual

The line between proper and "cruel and unusual" punishment for prison inmates is frequently hazy. But Federal Judge Robert Merhige Jr. last week had no difficulty deciding that Virginia Corrections Division Director W.K. Cunningham had crossed it. In a highly unusual ruling, he ordered Cunningham to pay $21,265 in damages to three former inmates because of practices "of such a shocking nature that no reasonable man could have believed that they were constitutional."

In 1971 Merhige handed down a sharply worded ruling that found the state's prison officials guilty of "grave disregard of constitutional guarantees." This time he cited specific illegal actions: bread-and-water diets, arbitrary use of tear gas, extended periods of solitary confinement, placing prisoners naked in a hot, roach-infested cell, and taping, chaining or handcuffing inmates to cell bars. The monetary award reflected the loss of prison pay through unconstitutional solitary confinement, plus what Merhige called "reasonable sums for pain and suffering."

In holding Cunningham personally responsible, Merhige stated that the practices the inmates were forced to endure "violate the lowest standards of decency," and became even more "odious" when carried out with Cunningham's knowledge and under his direction. Cunningham announced that he would appeal.

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