Mental health challenges are a widespread concern in correctional facilities, often contributing to both attempted and successful suicides. A variety of factors, including isolation, trauma, and lack of outside support, can severely affect an inmate’s mental well-being and lead to suicidal ideation.
An inmate taking their own life has a profound impact on everyone in the facility, from fellow inmates to correctional staff. It’s a crisis that no one takes lightly, prompting many in the industry to ask: What can be done to prevent inmate suicide?
In this blog, we explore how GUARDIAN RFID’s Command Cloud empowers correctional facilities with the tools and insights they need to help prevent these tragic outcomes.
Assigning Suicidal Inmates to a Special Compliance Status
When an inmate attempts to harm themselves or expresses intent, they must be monitored more frequently to reduce the risk of self-induced injuries or suicide. Regardless of a facility’s size, it can be challenging for officers to consistently remember and carry out these more frequent checks.
Command Cloud helps address this issue with its Special Statuses feature. This tool identifies inmates requiring specialized attention and categorizes them into three distinct status types:
- Special Compliance: This status is assigned to inmates who require more frequent wellness checks – typically at 5-, 10-, or 15-minute intervals. It includes individuals on suicide watch, behavior watch, or other high-risk monitoring needs.
- Special Info: This category includes important but non-urgent information that staff should be aware of, such as mobility aids (e.g., wheelchairs), special medical needs (e.g., glasses, dietary devices), gang affiliation, or access restrictions due to safety or security concerns.
- Meal Restrictions: As the name suggests, this status applies to inmates with dietary requirements, allergies, religious food accommodations, or other meal-related restrictions.
Inmates experiencing mental health crises or suicidal ideation should be placed under a Special Compliance Status to ensure they receive timely and consistent wellness checks. Command Cloud’s Special Status feature not only increases officer awareness and accountability by adjusting the frequency of compliance timers for affected locations, but it also provides real-time visibility into which high-risk individuals need more attention.
Inmates can be assigned a Special Status through either Mobile Command XR, Command Cloud’s mobile inmate tracking system, or Mission Command, its cloud-based platform that provides a shared operational view. Both of these platforms provide deep insights into all information related to any Special Status:
- Mobile Command XR empowers officers to view a live list of all inmates currently assigned a Special Status, along with their specific type of status. This centralized view is essential for maintaining operational awareness and ensuring no critical details are overlooked.
- Mission Command provides a detailed display of the vital information related to Special Statuses. Users can view a comprehensive snapshot of all inmates under Special Compliance, Special Info, and Meal Restrictions, along with a full Status History. This historical log helps corrections professionals identify behavioral patterns over time, enabling quicker and more informed responses when issues recur.
Complete Staggered, Unpredictable Rounds
Another way to help prevent inmate suicides is by requiring officers to conduct their security rounds less predictably. When officers perform checks at regular, consistent intervals, inmates can quickly recognize the pattern and anticipate when the next round will start. This creates what is known as a “window of opportunity” – a period during which inmates believe they can perform misconduct without immediate consequences, knowing there is a fixed interval before the next round of cell checks begins.
To add unpredictability, corrections officers can use Command Cloud’s Mobile Compliance Monitor (MCM), a series of digital timers that count down to when the next round is due. This allows officers to vary the timing of their checks within the allowed window. For example, an officer might start one round 15 minutes early, the next with 5 minutes remaining, and the following round 20 minutes before it's due.
MCM also includes a configurable warning system that alerts officers with either haptic or audible alarms when a round is nearing its scheduled due time. System administrators can customize the timing of these alerts during Command Cloud setup to align with the facility's specific needs, ensuring officers have sufficient time to complete their rounds. This feature enhances officer awareness and accountability, helping to ensure that rounds are completed, contributing to improving overall facility safety, and reducing the risk of inmate suicide.
Additionally, once an inmate is assigned a Special Status, MCM automatically adjusts its timer to match the required check frequency set by the system administrator. For example, if an inmate is on suicide watch and needs to be checked every 10 minutes, the system will override the standard 60-minute round interval and reset the timer to ensure compliance with a higher-frequency monitoring schedule. This time is completely customizable by system administrators to ensure that it aligns with facility policies.
By intentionally varying the start time of each round, officers reduce the likelihood that inmates can detect a pattern. Relying on the countdown timer to shift the timing of checks disrupts predictability, minimizing opportunities for inmates to plan harmful actions during perceived gaps in supervision.
Cascade County Jail, Montana
Consider Cascade County Jail in Great Falls, Montana – an agency that successfully prevented four suicide attempts over just four days. The staff’s rapid and effective attentiveness was made possible by real-time inmate tracking, digital officer accountability, and proactive monitoring, all powered by Command Cloud. Cascade County utilized the Mobile Compliance Monitor to provide real-time insights into check schedules and countdown timers, ensuring officer rounds were completed on time.
But how did this technology contribute to saving lives?
It began on March 14, 2025, when two separate inmates attempted to take their own lives. Thanks to timely security rounds, officers were able to intervene and administer life-saving aid, and both individuals were then evaluated by medical staff. Just two days later, another suicide attempt was interrupted by an officer conducting their rounds. Then, on March 18, officers intervened in a fourth attempt, again providing critical aid before transferring the inmate for further medical treatment.
Each of these incidents were swiftly detected and addressed with the help of Command Cloud’s real-time security check alerts. Upon their return to the facility, the affected inmates were placed on Suicide Watch Special Compliance Status using the system, ensuring continuous monitoring moving forward. Once these inmates were placed on Special Status, their location timers were adjusted to a more frequent cadence, ensuring closer monitoring and reducing the risk of further self-harm.
The GUARDIAN RFID system has been invaluable in ensuring inmate safety. We sincerely thank the Cascade County Commissioners for funding and supporting this life-saving technology.
Sheriff Slaughter | Cascade County Jail
Cascade County Jail stands as a strong example of how Command Cloud can be used to prevent inmate suicides and implement ongoing safeguards to reduce future risk. The combined use of the Mobile Compliance Monitor and Special Status features creates a system that limits opportunities for self-harm while ensuring high-risk individuals are closely monitored. With real-time alerts and continuous oversight, correctional staff can perform more frequent and staggered rounds, allowing facilities to intervene before a potential suicide attempt can take place.
