Mandela Rules classifier for solitary-confinement placements

Classify placement records under the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules, UN A/RES/70/175) which define prolonged solitary confinement as any continuous placement exceeding fifteen days. Provides three denominator conventions and an optional broader-restrictive-confinement classification that adds high-alert placements to the numerator.

Usage

mrm_classify_mandela(
  data,
  duration_col = "NumberConsecutiveDays_Segregation",
  year_col = "EndFiscalYear",
  id_col = "UniqueIndividual_ID",
  threshold_days = 15L,
  denominator = c("individual_any", "row", "individual_cumulative"),
  broader_rc = FALSE,
  alert_cols = c("MentalHealth_Alert", "SuicideRisk_Alert", "SuicideWatch_Alert"),
  meaningful_contact_col = NULL
)

Arguments

data: A data.frame or data.table containing at minimum the placement-duration column and a fiscal-year column.
duration_col: Column name (character) of consecutive-day placement durations. Default "NumberConsecutiveDays_Segregation".
year_col: Column name of the fiscal-year identifier. Default "EndFiscalYear".
id_col: Column name of the per-year individual identifier. Default "UniqueIndividual_ID". Required when denominator is anything other than "row".
threshold_days: Mandela duration threshold in days. Default 15 (UN Standard Minimum Rules).
denominator: One of "row" (per-placement), "individual_any" (proportion of individuals with any placement above threshold), or "individual_cumulative" (proportion of individuals whose total within-year segregation days exceed threshold). Default "individual_any".
broader_rc: Logical. If TRUE, the numerator additionally counts placements with alert-complexity >= 2 (using the three alert columns named in alert_cols) regardless of meeting threshold_days. Default FALSE.
alert_cols: Character vector of binary alert columns used to compute alert-complexity for the broader rate. Default the three b01 alert columns.
meaningful_contact_col: Optional. Column name of a 1-if-meaningful-contact indicator (federal Sprott-Doob style). When supplied, rows with met-contact are excluded from the numerator.

Value

A data.frame with columns:

year: Fiscal year (or "pooled").
denominator: Total denominator under the chosen convention.
n_mandela: Numerator: count of records (or individuals) classified as Mandela-prolonged.
rate: Proportion n_mandela / denominator, in the unit interval.
pct: Same as rate expressed as percentage.
n_broader_rc: Broader-rate numerator (if broader_rc).
rate_broader: Broader-rate proportion (if broader_rc).

Details

The provincial classification operates on duration alone (the duration_col column). The federal classification additionally requires unmet "meaningful contact" criteria (Sprott & Doob, 2021); if meaningful_contact_col is supplied, that column is treated as a 1-if-met indicator and rows with met-contact are excluded from the numerator regardless of duration.

References

United Nations General Assembly (2015). United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (the Nelson Mandela Rules). A/RES/70/175.

Sprott, J. B., & Doob, A. N. (2021). Solitary Confinement, Torture, and Canada's Structured Intervention Units. Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies, University of Toronto. Available at the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies web site: crimsl.utoronto.ca (file TortureSolitarySIUsSprottDoob23Feb2021_0.pdf).

Iftene, A., & Doob, A. N. (2024). Do Independent External Decision Makers Ensure that "An Inmate's Confinement in a Structured Intervention Unit Is to End as Soon as Possible"? (Corrections and Conditional Release Act, Section 33). Dalhousie Schulich School of Law, report 51. https://digitalcommons.schulichlaw.dal.ca/reports/51/

Examples

# Strict provincial Mandela on b01:
#   mrm_classify_mandela(b01_data)
#
# Broader restrictive-confinement (adds high-alert placements):
#   mrm_classify_mandela(b01_data, broader_rc = TRUE)