As government takes steps to respond to Sunday afternoon prison riot a magistrate is scheduled to meet in temporary court settings at the Lusignan Prison to grant bail to petty crimes offenders.
Commander of ‘C’ Division Calvin Brutus confirmed to the Guyana Chronicle that the magistrate will be at the Lusignan correctional facility this afternoon. The Georgetown Prison has been beset by overcrowding- something which has been raised over the years. As of Sunday over 1000 prisoners were being held at the Georgetown facility.

Public Security Minister Khemraj Ramjattan on Sunday night had said he was mulling several extraordinary measures to reduce the Camp Street Prison population, one of which is an early release of non-violent, well-behaved prisoners. Ramjattan was at the time responding to questions about the occupancy level of the Camp Street Prison in the light of Sunday’s fire which left hundreds of prisoners displaced. “It has to do with a lot of prisoners who are serving time, three years for possession. I have the statistics and a lot of them are there for possession of narcotics and trafficking of narcotics and all of that and they have served some time and they are of good behaviour,” he told reporters.

The minister added: “There is what is called a good behaviour, an early release date and a late release date, when you are going to serve [per se] a five-year term… If you are of good behaviour, you can get some remissions from me. I can give you as minister and the authority.”

This move, he said, stemmed from the recently held Commission of Inquiry into the prisons which recommended that the number of persons within the system on remand be reduced drastically, something that they have been trying to do.
“We spent approximately $60M, had a night court shift for some time period after speaking to both Mr. Carl Singh, then chancellor and the top echelons of the Judicial Service Commission and that was done.”

He noted that this, coupled with earlier trial dates for non-violent offences, has not reduced the remand limit of the Georgetown community, noting that close to 600 of the nearly 1200 fall within this bracket.
“We’ve had some of them who couldn’t pay their bail and who when the bail was granted, they didn’t have cash, so that also accumulated that high amount of persons there, in a prison that was not made for 11000 persons.”

Additionally, there is a possibility that as early as today, the minister will sit down with the Chancellor of the Judiciary to review some of the remand cases for lesser fines to be imposed. He was also quizzed about the capital expenditure at the Georgetown correctional facility being adequate. “It is also because there is a lack of money for these investments. We have to bail out sugar and we have to do so many other things and that is what is cramping our style in what we have to do for other sectors.”

He noted that many of the other recommendations of the prison inquiry that could be afforded were implemented and in the coming budget, more provisions will be made for which could not have been afforded last year.