EIGHTY per cent of prisoners lack the basic levels of education (ranging from never attending school to not completing secondary education), as findings suggest a possible link between a low level of social control at home when the inmates were children and subsequent criminal behaviour.

This is according to the “Guyana Prison Service Inmates Survey” which was released on Monday at the Police Training Centre, Camp Street, Georgetown.

The study which was conducted by the Citizens Security Strengthening Programme showed that more than half (54.3 per cent) of persons incarcerated, did not complete secondary education while 3.7 per cent did not attend school, 13.4 per cent had incomplete primary education, and 8.6 per cent had only completed primary education.

The goal of the study is to inform public officials on implementing adequate policies and to evaluate the current ones in dealing with the overcrowded prison system in Guyana.

As several criminological theories predict, the family and social environment where youngsters grow up may affect their proclivity to engage in anti-social behaviour, and some of them later on in crime.

The findings reveal that for a good share of the prisoners, their childhoods seem to have been conducive to the development of anti-social behaviour.

According to the responses in the study of a significant number of the inmates, it can be claimed they had been exposed to different criminalistic contexts during childhood.

For example, inmates said that they had been victims of violence in their homes, and/or they had had childhood friends who committed crimes.

It was also underscored that three out of 10 inmates (32.9 per cent) said that their parents had not lived together when they were very young.

Additionally, two out of 10 inmates (21.1 per cent) said that their parents had lived together on and off. Both findings suggest that broken homes correlate in many cases with criminal behaviour?

When asked up to what age they had lived with their mothers, the report stated that one out of three (32.4 per cent) said they had done so until they were 15 years old, 4.8 per cent until they were between one and six years old; 8.7 per cent until they were seven to 12 years old; 11.8 per cent until they were between 13 and 15 years old.

On the question of up to what age they had lived with their father, more than half of the inmates (55.1 per cent) said they had done so until they were 15 years old or younger. Furthermore, a good share of the inmates (29.4 per cent) said they had never lived with their father. Both findings suggest, like other previous variables, that inmates grew up in a context of family fragmentation.

Further, the life of the inmates as adults was found to be difficult too. Results show that a large share of the inmates used drugs or alcohol.

As regards drug consumption, inmates were asked which drugs they had used – the largest group (58 per cent) corresponds to inmates who said that they had used marijuana, while other types of drugs were consumed by a much smaller percentage of inmates.

The findings also suggest that, like in their childhoods, a good share of the inmates seemed to have lived in unstructured homes during their adult life.

In this vein, it is possible to infer that prisoners had suffered great economic hardship and found it hard to support and sustain their households.

However, underemployment or poor quality jobs, including jobs vastly exceeding 40 hours a week, was widespread among a large share of those who had a job at the time they committed the crime for which they were arrested.

Meanwhile, most inmates (69.1 per cent) reported having children. Almost four out of 10 of the inmates (35.9 per cent) who are parents said that their children were with different partners.

Like in their childhood, a good share of inmates seemed to live in a context of unstructured homes during their adult life. This finding may indicate that prisoners have suffered economic hardship and were thus unable to support and sustain different homes.

Inmates who reported having children were also asked about the age they became parents. Almost one out of three inmates with children (27.7 per cent) said they were 18 years old or younger.

Furthermore, more than half of them (55.9 per cent) had had their first child when they were 21 years’ old or younger. Having children at such early age might have limited job opportunities for a good share of the inmates.

During 2016, the Government of Guyana with the support of IADB agreed to develop and carry out an inmate survey for the country. Guyana had then five penitentiary centres that housed close to 2000 inmates (257 per 100,000, a high rate in the region).

Participation in the survey was strictly voluntary.