The Angola 3 
 
 As inmates at the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola, Woodfox -- who was originally convicted of armed robbery -- and Herman Wallace and Robert King had organized a chapter of the Black Panthers and had begun mobilizing other African American inmates against brutal conditions inside the prison. Instead, Mr. Woodfox, whose conviction for murdering a prison guard during prison unrest in 1972 has twice been overturned, spent most of his four-decade-long sentence at Angola in solitary confinement, alone in a small cell for 23 hours a day. On Monday, a judge cited “the prejudice done onto Mr. Woodfox by spending over forty years in solitary confinement” as one reason he will be released, and why the state will be barred from trying him a third time. “I ask why, and they say it’s because they can’t remember what they read three pages before.” 
 
 Prisoners in solitary confinement often develop confusion over when to be alert and when to sleep.  Albert Woodfox, a Louisiana inmate who has been in solitary confinement for more than 40 years, remained incarcerated Tuesday after a federal appeals court, seeking to give the state time to appeal, temporarily blocked a judge’s order that said the “Angola 3” member should be set free. Sign up for THE BRIEF and more view example 
 
 But Woodfox was held in solitary the longest of the three; for 43 years he has been kept in virtual isolation, his lawyer has said.
– The damaging effects of solitary confinement on a prisoner can appear within three months, sometimes sooner. Albert Woodfox has been in solitary confinement for 43 years, though he could be released from Louisiana State Penitentiary as early as Friday. Since 1972, Woodfox has spent 23 hours a day in a tiny cell that can be crossed in just four paces, the Los Angeles Times reports, but how he'll cope on the outside isn't clear. In a piece last year, Time reported prisoners in long-term isolation are subject to panic attacks, paranoia, disordered thinking, anger, and compulsive actions, like incessant pacing or cleaning, while their basic cognitive functions dim. They also have a hard time sleeping at night. "Without stimulation, people's brains will move toward stupor and delirium—and often people won't recover from it," the magazine reported, noting many are "incapable of tolerating their new environment" when eventually released. Already, Woodfox is battling "serious health problems caused or made worse by his years of close confinement," a rep for Amnesty International says. Both Amnesty and the United Nations agree his treatment has been "inhumane," reports Time. As many as 80,000 US inmates may be in solitary confinement at any one time, reports Christian Science Monitor, though some states are working to reduce that number amid higher rates of reoffending and suicide among the isolated. Still, some say solitary confinement serves a purpose. "For some people, solitary confinement is the only responsible way to incarcerate them," says a criminal sentencing expert. However, he adds, "solitary confinement is something that ought to be used as a last resort, because I don't think it promotes mental health, so you're not creating better citizens" upon release. (A lawsuit reveals the horrors of solitary confinement at Colorado's Supermax.)