…gov’t not likely to rebuild full-scale prison at Camp Street

CITING Sunday’s gutting of the Georgetown Prison as an “accident waiting to happen”, President David Granger on Tuesday said his administration does not intend to rebuild the Camp Street-based penitentiary prison as it was prior to the fire.

The President led members of Cabinet on a tour of the gutted facility around midday on Tuesday. The Head-of-State told online media entity, News Source, that the authorities will return to the drawing board “to determine whether it is appropriate to have a facility such as a prison at the centre of the capital city.” He said that the country’s three major prisons, Georgetown, New Amsterdam and Mazaruni Prisons were constructed by the British in each county. “So this is what was adequate maybe was 120 years ago,” President Granger said, noting that the authorities “definitely” will discuss what type of facility is needed following Sunday’s fire.

Noting that he will not prejudge the matter, the President said he will discuss the issue with Minister of Public Security, Khemraj Ramjattan, and members of Cabinet. “But we are not going to have the same type of facility here again,” he reiterated. He said the devastation at the site almost totalled the facility.

Eight on the run
Regarding questions on the figures provided by the authorities on how many prisoners escaped on Sunday, the President said that Director of Prisons, Gladwyn Samuels, has advised that eight persons are unaccounted for from the total prison population. The President said that the government was aware of the situation at Camp Street prior to the blaze and, according to him, the authorities were acting on recommendations made following the Commission of Inquiry (COI) after the riots at the prison last March. “We knew we had to strengthen Mazaruni (prison), money had been provided,” the President said. Government is in the process of expanding the facilities at the Mazaruni prisons.

”This was an accident waiting to happen”, the Head-of-State noted of the inferno. He explained too that the New Amsterdam prison was equally a “fragile structure”, noting that government is acting with the resources at hand. He assured that the Ministry of Public Security, at the end of the process, will have more secure prisons across the country, which he noted will not be susceptible to the cycle of breakouts which have been happening.

Hard decisions
Meanwhile, former Director of Prisoners, Dale Erskine believes that the authorities should focus now on finding solutions to the situation at hand rather than the faults. Erskine noted in a lengthy social media post on Tuesday that “judicious, hard and endurable decisions “ will be have to be acted on “swiftly” to ensure a stronger, new prison infrastructure is built . He said it has to be designed “in such a manner to diminish the will of prisoners to break out in the manner that occurred on Sunday, 9th July, 2017.”
Erskine, who sat as a Commissioner in last year’s COI into the March disturbances, noted that the relevant authorities were aware of the “vulnerability” and the “toxicity” of the Georgetown Prison.

He said daily there was a strong sense of vulnerability that “it could be your last day, considering the overpopulation, poor security design of most prison buildings, a high amount of dangerous, violent, in- discipline and angry prisoners, inadequate and poorly trained staff as well as a number of corrupt/unprofessional staff.”
He said those factors were “highly explosive” and officers did their utmost to ensure the situation at the prison was always under control. Erskine said the death of Prison Officer, Odinga Wickham, who succumbed to gunshot wounds following the unrest on Sunday, is evidence of how a quiet day can turn into deadly tragedy within minutes in the prison system.

Erskine urged the prisoners and their families to work with the prison administration and members of the Joint Services to bring normalcy to the situation. On Monday, the Government of Guyana (GoG) approved the “immediate implementation” of a four-part emergency plan to deal with the aftermath of Sunday’s massive inferno.
President Granger in a televised address to the nation said the four-part emergency plan has been activated and includes the construction of temporary structures to house the displaced prisoners in the short term, the completion of a recovery operation to account for and accommodate every single prisoner, implementation of legal measures to immediately reduce the prison population and, importantly, the immediate recapture of the inmates, who escaped custody.