Paying for petty crimes - Close to half of prison population jailed for minor offences
Published:Sunday | December 4, 2011 | 12:00 AM
Tyrone Reid, Senior Staff Reporter
Jamaican taxpayers are paying a hefty price for custodial sentences handed down to thousands of offenders who have committed minor offences.
Data provided by the Department of Correctional Services (DCS) revealed that between January and July of this year, 46 per cent of all lawbreakers sentenced were jailed for non-violent or minor offences as opposed to violent crimes and drug trafficking.
On a $3.7-billion budget for the last fiscal year, the DCS is straining at the seams. It costs $850,000 per annum to feed, clothe and care for each inmate, Lieutenant Colonel Sean Prendergast, commissioner of corrections, told The Sunday Gleaner.
When asked if he thought more non-custodial sentences would ease the prison system's chronic and protracted overcrowding malady, the commissioner said it was not his remit to tell members of the judiciary what types of sentences to hand down.
"I wouldn't be comfortable saying that. Judges have much more details than I do," said Prendergast. He added: "We are working very well with members of the judiciary and we have a very good relationship in handling these matters."
According to the commissioner, when arriving at a verdict, judges have to weigh several factors, including whether the person is a repeat offender.
Left to jurisprudence
"If an individual goes before a judge and non-custodial sentences are a reasonable option, I'm sure the judge will use it, but it is for them to decide. I'm not in a position to second-guess the judges," he said.
On the matter of overcrowding, the prison boss said this is a conti-nued problem, but the Ministry of National Security and the DCS are actively seeking ways to alleviate the congestion. Currently, the island's prison population stands at 4,500 (approximately 0.2 per cent of the country's 2.7 million) including juvenile offenders.
"We have institutions that have twice the population that they are meant to accommodate," he said. These include maximum-security facilities at the Tower Street and St Catherine adult correctional centres.
The commissioner revealed that the incarceration figures for the first seven months of 2011 mirrored those recorded for the corresponding period in 2010. "Roughly 50 per cent of the inmates were admitted for non-violent crimes," he said.
However, Prendergast noted that the use of more non-custodial sentences is among a string of options being explored by the national security ministry to reduce the overcrowding in the nation's prison system. He also said that the ministry was looking to expand the electronic-monitoring programme as well as the reclassification of inmates so that they can be transferred to medium- and low-security correctional facilities, which are not as cramped as the maximum security institutions.
The reclassification programme is being approached with great caution, said Prendergast, because of the high percentage of inmates charged with violent crimes.
"A decision is made as to whether they are suitable for movement to a lower-security institution. It is not a decision we take lightly because if we make a mistake on those assessments it can have dire consequences."
Another option on the cards is the construction of new prisons.