By Shauna Jemmott

GOVERNMENT should consider removing the Georgetown Prison from the center of the capital city, according to the report of the Commission of Inquiry into the Georgetown prison riots and resultant deaths.“Consider the removal of the Georgetown Prison from the centre of the city,” the report said.

The Prison Service experienced major disturbances with riotous behaviour, mass escapes, fires and roof top protests, over decades, dating as far back as the riots at the Georgetown Prison in 1964.

The report recalled the mass escapes in 1989, riots and mass escape at the Lusignan Prison in 1995 and 1996, riots and fires at the Mazaruni Prison in 1997, major escapes at the Georgetown Prison in 1999 and 2002, riots at the Georgetown Prison in 2006 and 2007, mass escapes at the New Amsterdam Prison in 2007, and riot at the Georgetown Prison in Nov 2013. It said several Boards of Inquiry were conducted and numerous recommendations made to improve the conditions and management of the prison, and a Disciplined Services Report was also done.

VULNERABILITY
“The vulnerability of the Prisons to major security breaches and their effects on national security has always being a major concern to the Prison Administration, Guyana Police Force and other Joint Services entities, the executive, politicians, non-governmental organizations and citizens respectively.”

As a result of the threats to a stable security environment, the Guyana Prison Service developed a document called “Fire Threat & Evacuation Procedures Georgetown Prison – A Joint Services’ Response June 2001,” in which are the Standard Operational Procedures (SOPs).

“In 2005, the continuous threats to the general (safety) and security of the prison community (officers, inmates), infrastructure and importantly the society at large, particularly by Georgetown Prison, resulted in the Chairman of the Joint Services Coordinating Council (JSCC), Brigadier Edward Collins, directing the development of the Joint Services Contingency Plans to major Prison Disturbances at the Georgetown Prison.”

The location of the jail in the centre of the city and in close proximity to business and civilian communities was since then a major challenge, especially with the high number of special watch and high profile inmates and the incarceration of an increasingly violent population.

“Inadequate staff and gender imbalance in staffing, (as well as) inadequate facilities to segregate and separate various classes of inmates,” were also of major concerns that the CoI report stated.