Inmates have no Security Guarantees
13:43, February 5, 2013 | News | Right to Life | Detention Facilities
The degree of legal protection in Armenia is on an extremely poor level, which is not conditioned only by the low level of legal awareness. Unfortunately, it is due to distrust and insecurity towards legal system. Artur Sakunts, Chairman of Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly Vanadzor shares this viewpoint.
“Transferring narcotic drugs is the major type of crimes at penitentiaries, which seems to be a well-known fact”, noted Sakunts in an interview with Pastinfo.am correspondent by adding that the protocols compiled by the law-enforcement bodies over the cases of drug transfers poorly illustrate the actual phenomenon.”
According to him, corruption can also trigger crimes at penitentiaries, but a relevant investigation isn’t carried out regarding it. Drug trading exists in all countries, while at detention facilities inmates, confined for contraband of drugs, would hardly refrain from illegal drug circulation despite being shut at a closed facility.
Among the issues recorded at penitentiaries in 2012 our interlocutor also pointed out the overcrowded state of detention facilities. By Sakunts’ words, “The overcrowded condition at penitentiaries creates a deficit, and where there is a deficit, there is also corruption. If the cells at penitentiaries are set for 8 persons and 20 inmates are kept there, then, this is itself a crime and a violation of human rights.”
Certainly, the RA Criminal Code does not define it as a criminally prosecuted act, however, that latter perceives it as a violation of human rights.
But why don’t the prisoners and inmates complain of the created situation?
“It is because they are deprived of security guarantees”, states Sakunts and adds that in case of complaints, additional pressures may be exerted against them by the staff while turning their lives into a hell.
As to the existence of mobile phones at penitentiaries, Sakunts is convinced, “Evidently, it is through the penitentiary staff that those phones reach their addressees and the passing of is not done merely for the sake of “cute eyes”. None of the corruption parties, neither the giver nor the taker is determined to voice about it.”
“The mortality rate at penitentiaries has increased 4 times, but no complaints that the death cases are due to improper administration of medical services, are received. The relatives of deceased inmates don’t often demand conducting an investigation and revealing the real triggers leading to the inmate’s death”, says Sakunts and emphases that pursuant to Convention against Torture, the state is obliged to carry out an investigation irrespective of existing complaints, but in Armenia this problem is not regulated by law.