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| Several Bureau of Prison employees have complained about the attention that Thomas Silverstein receives on my web page. He murdered one of their fellow correctional officers, Merle Clutts. If you would like to post a note commemorating Officer Clutts or any other prison official who was murdered in the line of duty, please post your message on my guest page or mail your photograph or news clippings to Pete Earley, Post Office Box 221171, Chantilly, Virginia 20151. I will return them after the manager of my web page posts them on the Remembrances for Fallen Officers page. 
The "Silverstein Suite" built just for him
is located at the end of the Special Housing Unit (SHU), a building isolated
from the main prison. Silverstein was moved here in 1989 from his basement
dungeon, that is described in The Hot House. The SHU is a "prison inside
a prison" and is commonly call "the hole." It's where convicts are sent
for punishment. Silverstein is kept in his cell twenty-three hours per
day. At certain times, an electronic door is opened for one hour, so he
can step into the outside recreation area or into an indoor recreation
cage. He is NOT allowed into the hallway in this drawing. That is used
by officers when they need to microwave his meals or check on him face-to-face.
There is a visiting room attached to the indoor recreation cage, but since
the Bureau of Prisons doesn't allow him visitors, it has not been used.
These three rooms -- his cell and the two recreation cages -- are his
entire world. Because he is under constant surveillance, the only time
that he sees other humans is when food is brought to his cell. He has
been kept under "no human contact" conditions since 1983. 
This is the view that Silverstein sees when
he sits at the back of his cell.
This is the view from the front of the cell,
looking back. 
This is the view from the exercise bike in
the indoor recreation room. At one point, Silverstein did two thousands
situps and one thousand push ups per day to stay fit. He did them in groups
of one hundred. 
Silverstein standing in his outside recreation
cage. The ceiling is open to the sky but is covered by steel bars. 
Because of his reputation, Silverstein is
surrounded by a minimum of eight officers whenever he is removed from
his cell. Another officer video tapes the move in case there is a scuffle.
The video tape is taken to prove that Silverstein's civil rights were
not violated. 
The government reviews Silverstein's isolated
status every six months. So far, it has seen no reason to move him into
a more normal environment where he could interact with other inmates.
He is considered in sound mental condition despite his long term segregation
and lack of visitors. Once a month, a prison psychologist visits Silverstein
to ask how he is doing. If he shows anger or complains about his conditions,
then the psychologist knows that he is "mentally stable" since that reaction
is considered a normal one. 
Silverstein's self-portrait. Want to react to his drawings? You can write to him at: Thomas Silverstein, 14634-116 SAC-1, Post Office Box 1000, Leavenworth, Kansas, 66048. |