Bridgewater State Hospital - History

History

By the 1970s the campus of the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Bridgewater (MCIB) housed four separate facilities: The State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, the Treatment Center for Sexually Dangerous Persons, a center for alcoholics, and a minimum security prison.

In 1968 there were hearings conducted after a study showed that there were 30 inmates committed to the state hospital illegally. Most of the prisoners stayed at Bridgewater because they did not have the legal skills or money available to help their claim. Many of the prisoners' terms had long expired. An example of this was a patient named Charles who was sentenced to Bridgewater in 1910 for breaking and entering. The maximum time for this felony was two years, and he still remained in the prison after 1967. Furthermore in later news, it was found that the number of inmates at Bridgewater grew to 500. Many felt that society was not doing its job in distinguishing men that needed regular prison rehabilitation and psychiatric help. There needed to be changes in what constitutes a person to be sent to a mental hospital. Also among the changes that needed to be implemented were the confidentially between the inmates and the doctors as well as having a standard by which a person is considered mentally insane.

In 1967 a legislative committee investigated allegations of "cruel, inhuman, and barbarous treatment". There were witnesses who were able to describe problems with the water and sewage systems, insufficient medical, kitchen, and recreational facilities. As a result in 1972 John Boone, the Massachusetts Commissioner of Corrections, closed the segregation unit at Bridgewater State Hospital because it required maintenance. Bridgewater's facilities were not suitable for the standard means of health and living. There were 90-year-old cell blocks which did not have any toilets. Boone closed the Departmental Segregation Unit at Bridgewater to hold hearings for the sixteen inmates who had been transferred out of Norfolk.

Albert DeSalvo, who confessed to being the Boston Strangler, was an inmate at Bridgewater in 1967. He briefly escaped and was transferred to the maximum security prison at Walpole.

Many of the prisoners at Bridgewater State Hospital were not criminally insane people. This is evident with a man who painted a horse in 1938. He was sent to Bridgewater because he painted a horse with stripes to make it look like a zebra. He was a poor vendor whose occupation was selling fresh fruit. In order to appeal to the people and increase his sales, he painted the horse. He was later arrested at the age of 29 and charged with drunkenness. He died at the facility at an old age where he was only supposed to serve at Bridgewater for two years.

There was a time at the Bridgewater State Hospital when many of the inmates were there long after their sentence date. In 1968 over 250 cases were reviewed of forgotten men at Bridgewater. There were inmates that were at Bridgewater for over twenty-five years. Some inmates were transferred to Bridgewater from other jails and prison facilities and kept at Bridgewater for much longer than their sentences entailed.