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This presentation provides an overview of the Judicial Inspectorate of Correctional Centers' Annual Report for 2010/11, focusing on key issues such as overcrowding, inmate transfers, deaths in prison, and use of force. It also discusses the state of correctional centers and the performance of the JICS.
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Summary of Judicial Inspectorate of Correctional Centers Annual Report for 2010/11 Mpho Mathabathe: Researcher Portfolio Committee on Correctional Services
Introduction • The purpose of this presentation is to assist the Portfolio Committee on Correctional Services on its oversight over the Annual Report of JICS. • This is in line with Section 55(2) of the Constitution which states that the National Assembly is required to provide mechanisms to ensure that executive organ of state and public entities in the national sphere of government are accountable to it.
Mission of JICS • Mission of the JICS is: • To conduct independent, efficient and effective monitoring of conditions in prisons and the treatment of prisoners. • To foster partnership with the community and other stakeholders to promote the humane treatment of prisoners and their re-integration into the community.
JICS Performance for 2010/11 • This AR (Annual Report) consist of 6 chapters. • Four of the six chapters focus on issues related to offenders and prisons while remaining chapters look at inner workings of the JICS and community involvement. • The presentation only focus on key issues raised in this report such as State of our Correctional centers including overcrowding, transfer of inmates, death in prison, use of force and complaints of inmates .
Office of Inspecting Judge • The office was headed by Judge Hurter van Zyl whose contract came o an end at the end of October 2011. • Mr. Gideon Morris left the Inspectorate to take a post of Chief Director in the Provincial Government of Western Cape and Mr. Adams Carelse took over the position of a Director. • The Inspecting Judge indicated that there was a great improvement in the relationship between the Inspectorate and DCS. • Staff compliments of Inspectorate was 44 including staff on fixed contract. • Total expenditure for the year amounted to R20 262 780.49.
State of Correctional Centers • The report indicates that DCS operated 241 facilities of which 129 were used for male offenders only, 8 for females only and 91 for combination of males and females. 13 additional centers were dedicated for youth offenders. • This facilities had joined capacity of 118 154 offenders but by march 2011 there were 160 545 inmates both sentenced and unsentenced. • The report shows that Gauteng was leading in terms of overcrowding followed by Eastern Cape the Western Cape.
State of Correctional Centers (Cont..) • The report also touches on ATDs who constituted 29.86% of prison population. • The report shows that the number of ATDs tend to fluctuate between October of one year and February the following year. • The report also notes a serious concern regarding the fact that majority of sentenced inmates in detention constitute long-time offenders serving sentences ranging from 20 years to Life imprisonment (52 050).
Transfer of inmates • Chapter two of the report deals with transfer of inmates from one center to another. • A larger number of complaints received by the Inspectorate relates to transfers and this has been one of the common complaints over the past five years and remains so even today • It is suggested that the number of “punitive” or “preventative” transfers exceed those at the request of inmates. • A survey was conducted by the inspectorate amongst inmates and Heads of Centers in order to identify the root causes of all problems associated with transfers.
Transfer of inmates (cont..) • The survey was conducted at 194 centers of which only 185 Heads of Centers participated in the structured interviews. • The interview reveals that on average offenders had to wait 7 months before receiving response about their transfer. The shortest was 2 days and the longest was 3 years. • Among other reasons inmates request transfer include maintaining family contact, need to continue with studies, educational programmes or skills training, their medical or health conditions.
LESSONS FROM THE PAST Transfer of inmates (Cont..) • Other inmates indicated that they wish to be removed from their families for their own safety and with a view to avoid gang-related incidents. • The findings of the research indicates that more inmates were transferred for reasons other than their own request • It also appeared in substantial number of cases that families of inmates were not informed of their transfer.
Death in prison • Section 15(2) of Correctional Services Act requires that all death in prison be reported to the Inspecting Judge of prisons • JICS has acknowledged improvements in the report by the Dept on investigation into inmates death and the use of medical officers who have fully and properly completed the required reporting forms regarding circumstances surrounding the death of an inmate • The report highlights that there has been a decrease in cases of unnatural death in correctional facilities from 55 (in 2009/10) to 48 (in 2010/11)
Overcrowding Death in prison (Cont..) • Most of these death were suicide (31) of which majority of them (26) were as a results of inmates hanging themselves in a shower. • The report also indicates that in 8 cases where inmates were killed an official or officials were involved and KZN was leading with cases where officials killed inmates. • The report also raises concern around death as a results of gang activities especially where relevant officials were aware of such activities.
Integrated Justice System Death in prison (Cont..) • Suicide is another cause of death which the Inspectorate raises serious concerns about especially where inmates hang themselves in a shower area of communal cells and in such circumstances it would be difficult to prevent suicide of an inmate who was not visible to patrolling officials. • This in an important point raised by this report as it also gives another reason why CCTV cameras should be installed inside prison cells.
Care and Development Death in prison (Cont..) • The report does not provide the figures for natural death in correctional facilities for 2010/11, however it highlights that for 2009/10 a total of 900 natural deaths were recorded. • The report also indicates that there were three (3) unreported deaths of infants in Johannesburg and Durban female Correctional Centres.
Social Reintegration Segregation • The report has noted an improvement on the level of compliance by Head of Centres to report cases of segregation which increased from 5 558 (in 2009/10) to 8 155 in the reporting period. • Of the total number of (8 155) recorded cases of segregation, the inspectorate only received 52 referrals from inmates directly and 32 out of this 52 came from the two private prisons, Mangaung and Kutama Sinthumule.
Facilities Segregation (Cont..) • The report ascribe this to the failure by Heads of Centres to inform inmates about their rights to refer segregation to the Inspecting Judge for consideration
Prison Labour Use of force • Section 32(6) of the Act (Correctional Services Act 111 of 1998) states that all instances of the use of force must be reported to the Inspecting Judge. • For 2010/11, the Inspectorate only recorded 10 reports on the use of force. This figure indicates a substantially under-reporting and this issue was raised with the department and the excuse from DCS was the limited electronic means to report such cases to the Inspectorate.
Dealing with complaints from Inmates • The role of JICS among others is to report on the treatment of prisoners and the conditions in prison. This includes receiving complaints from prisoners. • The report indicate that Independent Visitors deal with inmates complains by paying regular visits to correctional centers, conducting private interviews with inmates, recording complaints in an official diary and monitoring the way in which they have been dealt with
Dealing with complaints from inmates (Cont..) • The report shows that a total of 381 924 complaints were recorded during the reporting period and overwhelming majority of those complaints were related to communication with families, transfers and health. • Complaints regarding communication with families were 45 994 followed by transfer (42 185) then health care (39 868).
Conclusion • The report provided broader picture of issues affecting offenders in correctional centres including overcrowding, death in prison, segregation, transfer of inmates as well as complaints. • There are other issues that the report could have touched on including issues such as HIV/AIDS as well as gangsterism in prison. • The report does not indicate whether the JICS has achieved its target or not simply because there are no targets set for the Inspectorate at the beginning of the financial year.
Conclusion (Cont.) • This could assist the Inspectorate to evaluate whether their services are still relevant or not • The report does not provide information on some of the challenges they encountered in their daily functioning with the department especially challenges faced by Independent Visitors on their daily visits in correctional centres and how these challenges have been or will be deal with.
