Phillips. sees transferring less dangerous prisoners to other locations as a possible solution

THE Ministry of National Security is moving to address the overcrowding in the island's prisons by building a new penal institution, repairing the existing facilities and transferring re-classified lower-risk inmates to less crowded locations.

"What we are seeking to do is, first of all, repair some of the buildings. and reduce the congestion," minister of national security, Dr Peter Phillips, told the Standing Finance Committee last week.

He was responding to questions from Delroy Chuck, the member of parliament for St Andrew North Eastern, who pointed out that the institutions were "woefully" overcrowded.

According to the security minister, one possible solution was transferring reclassified inmates to less crowded locations.
"We are looking at the reclassification of prisoners and transferring them to other institutions," Phillips explained.
"Alongside that, we are trying to upgrade some of the security arrangements at some of the other institutions so that it can take some of the less dangerous prisoners out there."
Reclassification of prisoners, he explained, was now done twice per month.

Chuck. highlighted the overcrowding problem in the nation's prisons

Chuck, who maintained that the overcrowding was a result of short-term prisoners being sent to district prisons, recommended that reclassifications should be done more often.

"Probably 40 per cent of the prison population right now should not be in prison, for the simple reason that they are there because they can't pay the fines," the Opposition MP said. "These are not high risk prisoners, the court has fined them but they can't pay the fine so they are there."

Other measures being examined, according to the security minister, included revamping the parole system.

"We are going to be undertaking a review of the parole system," Minister Phillips said, "because we actually believe that we need to develop a system where any person who reaches the point of eligibility should automatically receive a hearing and the discretion about the hearing should be removed."

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