A LOT is being done to address the issue of overcrowding and discord within prisons, Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan told reporters yesterday.He said that at the Camp Street Prison they are trying to open up the Brick Prison section where a brand new wing was added to accommodate 160 inmates, noting that recently a trestle fell and damaged a section of the jail.

The minister stated that they have to remove prisoners from that part since it was weakened and they will be re-located to the new Brick Prison section which needs renovation. The doors are being strengthened and in two weeks time inmates would be placed in that holding section.

HUGE PROBLEM
He disclosed that overcrowding is a huge problem since there is need for a new prison, but the capital works for that would be huge. At this time government is not in a position to afford that so they will have to make do with what they have, he said.

Ramjattan said, in the meantime, transfer from the damaged section to the Brick Prison will require some rehabilitation works and he will have to get Cabinet’s approval.

He explained that the Cabinet papers are being presented for approval and thereafter the section will be re-constructed which was very dilapidated along with the trestle and so on.

Ramjattan said the money may sum up to $150M and in view of the needs of a better structure at the Camp Street Prison they will definitely need Cabinet’s approval while considering the building of a new prison elsewhere.

GANG FIGHTS
In addition to the rehabilitation works, there are reports of inter-gang fights within the prison in which prisoners were injured and hospitalised. Ramjattan said it requires a stronger wall to divide Capital A from Capital B blocks of the prison.

He told the media that the inmates from these two blocks are at ‘loggerheads’ on most occasions for some most extraneous reasons. “I have heard some people are throwing in items over the fence during the course of the night and some Capital A prisoners feel that it was their items.”

Ramjattan said they have to put more patrols around the prison to prevent outsiders from throwing prohibited items over the walls and within they will construct a stronger wall to divide the two blocks.

He stated that a solid cast concrete wall will be constructed to separate the Capital A from the Capital B blocks of the Camp Street Prison and they are in the process of getting monies to prevent further gang fighting in that section of the jail.

The minister added that during a visit last week at the Camp Street Prison he spoke to several prisoners in the Capital A Block where he saw the conditions they were residing in and many told him they are hard-pressed having to wait so long for trials in the courts.

Ramjattan stated that one prisoner told him he has been awaiting trial for seven years and many said they have been there for more than five years.

He told reporters that he pleaded with the inmates and after a little exchange they handed in about 50 pieces of prohibited items. It was the first time they actually saw a government minister visiting the prison.

Within recent times there have been some tensions in the Camp Street Prison where prisoners ignited mattresses among other things to secure the attention of the media over their concerns about ill-treatment being meted out to them.

Ramjattan said prisoners can become very explosive at any given time in prison and they cannot guarantee anything. He noted that the prison was not made to accommodate so many inmates.

He said, “With that in mind I can say all the nice things to you all today and tomorrow we can have a very explosive situation in jail and I could be embarrassed by it but having spoken to them (prisoners) they promised to keep their part of the deal by waiting for early trials and so on.”

The minister said that vocational training is part of the prison system in which prisoners are equipped with a life skill before they are re-integrated into society upon their release.

He noted that in the prisons they have various training programmes in carpentry, masonry, electrical installation, numeracy and literacy in addition to a drug counselling programme where they try to get many prisoners to be enrolled, especially inmates who would have applied for parole.

By Michel Outridge