What is Protective Custody?
Protective custody is the term for when a law enforcement officer takes a person into custody in order to bring that person to a doctor or psychologist for an evaluation for possible involuntary psychiatric hospitalization. The law enforcement officer must use the least restrictive form of transportation that meets the security needs of the situation when taking the person to the evaluation.
Protective custody is a method that segregates prisoners for various reasons to protect inmates from violence while incarcerated. Some of these reasons include: • The inmate is a gang member and rival gangs are in general population. • The inmate is a target for sexual predators. • The inmate may be known to other inmates as a former policeman or other law enforcer. • The inmate may be known as a child molester by general population members. • There may be issues of violence between inmates from outside of the prison that could continue within general population. Protective custody is different from punitive segregation. Punitive is for punishment; protective segregation is for inmates in need of special protection. The Protective Custody Unit at Suffolk County provides all the education programs described above, as well as general management, drafting, art, sociology, biology, and physical science. Courses are taken very seriously in the protective custody unit. No course is taught th
