A PROCESS APPROACH TO SUICIDE PREVENTION BEHIND BARS: A Working Guide for Program Directors and Practitioners

Inmate suicide is a national tragedy and a leading cause of death among offenders. Substantial work over the past twenty years, primarily motivated by litigation, has been accomplished in identifying risk factors, constructing risk profiles, and developing effective prevention and intervention methods. Inmate suicide is rarely an isolated event and most often involves a process during incarceration that leads an offender to take his or her life.Dr. Ronald L. Bonner offers a process approach to help integrate the various key components of inmate suicide prevention. A Process Approach to Suicide Prevention Behind Bars covers the areas of suicidal behavior incidents, stages of the suicide process, risk factors, screening and assessment, interventions, professional standards, case law, and risk management.This process model serves as a valuable working guide for directors and practitioners of correctional suicide prevention. Ultimately, efforts will be measured by the understanding and compassion shown to offenders who face seemingly insurmountable stress and problems of living and who are coping with breakdown, depression, hopelessness, psychache, and the isolation panic of the correctional environment.

Ronald L. Bonner, PsyD, is a clinical psychologist who has worked with inmates over the past nineteen years. He has authored or coauthored more than fifty publications and serves as a consulting editor for Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior.