Prison and jail conditions here remain poor and deteriorating with the Georgetown Prisons holding twice its capacity, the US State Department says in its latest Human Rights Report.
The report, issued yesterday, covered 2010 and according to the State Department, in addition to poor prison and jail conditions and lengthy pre-trial detention, the principal human rights abuses were complaints of unlawful killings by police, and mistreatment of suspects and detainees by security forces. Other problems included allegations of government corruption, including among police officials, and sexual and domestic violence against women and abuse of minors.
The report pointed out that police holding cells were particularly poor and capacity and resource constraints remain a problem with the Prison Authority reporting at the end of October last year that there were 2,122 prisoners in five facilities, which had a combined design capacity of 1,580.
Approximately half of the prisoners were in Georgetown’s Camp Street Prison, which was designed to hold 600 inmates but held 1060. Overcrowding was in large part due to backlogs of pre-trial detainees, who constituted approximately 41 percent of the total prison population, the report said. It was noted that there were 83 female prisoners, all at the New Amsterdam Prison.
The report noted that juvenile offenders 16 years and older were held with the adult prison population while those below 16 years were held in the New Opportunity Corps (NOC), a juvenile correctional centre that offered primary education, vocational training, and basic medical care. Problems at the NOC included lax security and understaffing. There were complaints that juvenile runaways, or those out of their guardians’ care, were placed with juveniles who had committed crimes leading some petty offenders to become involved in more serious criminal activity, the report said.
It pointed out that due to inadequate facilities, juvenile female pretrial detainees were sometimes held with adult female pretrial detainees.
The report said that there were reported cases of deaths in prisons due to neglect or prison official abuse and cited the killing last year of prisoner Dyal Singh by Solomon Blackman said to be mentally ill and who was also killed by other prisoners. It noted that the law prohibits torture but there were reports alleging mistreatment of inmates by prison officials. It noted that unlike in past years when all newly hired prison guards received limited human rights training from the Guyana Human Rights Association, the association was not invited to perform training during the year.
Meantime, the report also says that prisoners and detainees had reasonable access to visitors and were permitted religious observances. It said that the government investigated and monitored prison and detention centre conditions and there are prison visiting committees for the Georgetown, Mazaruni, New Amsterdam, and Timehri prisons with the committees required to monitor prison conditions and report findings to the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Prison Administration. However, there was no known independent monitoring during the year. Conditions have improved at the Brickdam lockups following renovations but although precinct jails were intended to serve only as pretrial holding areas, “some suspects were detained there as long as two years, awaiting judicial action on their cases,” the report said too.
Corruption
Meanwhile, the State Department pointed out that the World Bank’s worldwide governance indicators reflected that government corruption was a serious problem. It said that the law provides for criminal penalties for official corruption but noted that there were reports alleging government corruption and complacency in enforcing these laws with respect to officials engaged in corrupt practices. “There was a widespread public perception of serious corruption in the government, including law enforcement and the judicial system. Low-wage public servants were easy targets for bribery. In January, there were 62 GPF [Guyana Police Force] members before the courts charged with various crimes including robbery, simply larceny, bribery, and indecent assault,” the report said.
It said that public officials are subject to financial disclosure laws and are required to submit information about personal assets to the Integrity Commission, but compliance was uneven and the commission had no resources for enforcement or investigations. “The law does not provide for public access to government information. Government officials were generally reluctant to provide information without approval from senior administration officials,” the State Department added.
Rape
As it relates to sexual and domestic violence against women, the State Department said that rape is a problem and pervasive in society but ineffective police and prosecutors resulted in few charges and fewer convictions. It also pointed to the illegality of incest but noted that this criminal act, like rape, was neither frequently reported nor successfully prosecuted.
The State Department said that domestic violence and violence against women, including spousal abuse, was widespread and crossed racial and socioeconomic lines. While the law prohibits domestic violence and allows victims to seek prompt protection, occupation, or tenancy orders from a magistrate, this legislation frequently was not enforced because of a lack of willingness to press charges on behalf of the victims and/or a lack of confidence in obtaining a remedy through the courts, the report said. “Some victims preferred to reach a pecuniary settlement out of court. There were reports of police accepting bribes and other reports of magistrates applying inadequate sentences to convictions. Additionally, cases that appear for a violation of protective order tend to be categorized as assault cases”, the State Department said.
It noted that the Sexual Offences Bill which broadens the definition of rape to include spousal rape, coercion, new child-sex offences, and the creation of offences for vulnerable adults with a learning disability or mental disorder has been signed into law. According to the report, during last year, 42 persons were charged with rape and 20 were convicted (a figure that includes persons charged in preceding years). Additionally, during the year, 201 persons were charged with statutory rape and 53 were convicted (including persons charged in preceding years).
In addition, the State Department said that there were some reports of physical and sexual abuse of children. During the year Help and Shelter handled 78 cases of child abuse and nine child abuse cases were filed with the courts, of which one was committed to the High Court, two were dismissed and six were ongoing. “Law enforcement officials and NGOs believed that the vast majority of child rape and criminal child abuse cases were not reported. As with cases of domestic abuse, NGOs noted reports that some police officers and magistrates could be bribed to make cases of child abuse “go away”,” the report said.
In relation to the law enforcement agencies, the State Department said that the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) received 13 complaints of unlawful killings and there were also allegations of police abuse of suspects and detainees; however, unlike in 2009, there were no reports of torture. In addition, during the year, the PCA received 11 complaints of unnecessary use of violence. Local media reported several cases of random police brutality, arrest, and interrogation prior to investigation, it said.
Inadequate training
The report also highlighted that inadequate training, poor equipment, and acute budgetary constraints severely limited the police effectiveness while public confidence in, and cooperation with, the police remained low. There were reports of corruption in the police force. Police force abuses may be reported to the PCA. However, the PCA does not possess an independent investigation unit, it noted. The State Department pointed out that the PCA received approximately 400 written and oral complaints, 230 of which were sent from the commissioner of police, primarily for police neglect of duties or misconduct in public places, unlawful arrest, illegal search, corrupt transactions, and unnecessary use of force.
Meanwhile, lengthy pre-trial detention, due primarily to judicial inefficiency, staff shortages, and cumbersome legal procedures, remained a problem. The average length of pre-trial detention ranged from six to 18 months for those awaiting trial at a magistrate’s court and for those awaiting trial in the High Court, the report noted.
“Delays and inefficiencies undermined judicial due process. Delays were caused by shortages of trained court personnel and magistrates, inadequate resources, postponements at the request of the defence or prosecution, occasional allegations of bribery, poor tracking of cases, and the slowness of police in preparing cases for trial”, it said.
