The death of another prisoner has once again put the focus on the Corradino Correctional Facility.
This time, the incident sparked the self-suspension of the prison director, Alex Dalli, who had been under pressure for quite a while – not only because of the number of suicides that have occurred in the last three years, but also as a result of his style of leadership which, to many prisoners and their families, is distressing. He is now on half-pay, and it is unclear if he will be reinstated.
For months the government had resisted calls for his removal, with Home Minister Byron Camilleri appearing to be reluctant to take any action in his regard. This latest death, however, forced a decision.
So much has been said and written about ways which are no longer consonant with 21st Century styles. Apart from Dalli’s position, there have been suggestions on a comprehensive reform in our prison system to bring it closer to a rehabilitation exercise rather than a form of punishment.
We will be getting a better idea when a board led by psychiatrist Anton Grech concludes a report that it was asked to compile in August. The board was initially given 60 days to finish its task, but has since had its remit extended to give it more time to finalise its work.
The board will be evaluating procedures used in prison to assess the mental and physical health of the inmates, especially those who are just at the start of their sentence, and also come up with support measures for drug dependants.
One important factor that needs to be pointed out is that when there is a reference to 14 deaths, what is not said is that some of them were from natural causes. By putting all the deaths in the same basket people are getting the impression that they were all suicides, when this is not the case.
This, however, does not mean that what is happening is not of concern. Every life counts.
Numbers
Statistics do not lie, and it is common knowledge that the rate of suicides in prison, in every country, is higher than the national averages. The prison environment, confined spaces, bullying from other inmates, despair and loss of relationships are among the main reasons for suicides. Inmates who have long sentences often cannot envisage an end to their ordeal, and there are then some who experience a sense of fear of returning to society when their sentence is about to end.
Malta has experienced a growth in the number of suicides in the past years. According to a report on the Annual Penal Statistics on Prison Populations, Malta had a rate of 25.2 suicides per 10,000 inmates in 2019, second only to Iceland (61).
Armenia, with 22.5 deaths per 10,000, followed Malta along with Denmark (21.7), Norway (19) and France (17). The overall suicide rate in Europe in 2019 was 5.2 per 10,000 inmates, which means that Malta’s rate was four times as many as the European average.
Other statistics from the same report show that Malta is in the top five when it comes to the presence of foreigners at the prison. More than half of the inmates – 51.5% – are foreigners. Only Luxembourg (73.9%), Switzerland (69.6%), Greece (57.8%) and Austria (53.1%) have a higher proportion of foreigners.
One fourth of the inmates in Malta, 25.2%, are in prison on drug-related offences. In this respect, Malta is in 11th place, with Latvia (44.2%), Iceland (34.6%), Italy (31.5%), Greece (29.4%) and Azerbaijan (29%) in the top five.
People
But it must be emphasised that behind these numbers there are people, and their families and friends.
Prisons, however, are there for a reason. And they should continue to be there to protect society.
It is the way that society deals with its members who commit a crime.
Prisons have the purpose of retribution, which is the punishment inflicted for crimes against society.
They also have the purpose of incapacitation, which is the removal of dangerous people from society so that they can no longer cause harm or be a danger to others.
Prisons also serve as a deterrent, hoping that their existence stops people from committing a crime and discourage them from breaking the law.
And they should also be a place for rehabilitation, in the hope that, once their prison term ends, inmates could return to society as better persons.
It is this last part which is the most controversial. This is because, too often, inmates leave prison in a worse situation than they entered. Being exposed to hardened criminals on a daily basis has the reverse effect of rehabilitation.
Still, the prison authorities have the duty to provide inmates with every possibility of reforming themselves before they return to society.
Not a hotel
Having said this, a prison should retain its status as a place where criminals are kept to serve time after committing a crime. It is not a hotel, and therefore some form of discipline must be exercised to maintain order. There have to be rules which must be followed.
How far this discipline and rules system goes is debatable. There are some who, for example, argue against solitary confinement, inflicted on inmates who do not follow prison regulations. This, they say, is a double punishment. Others insist that unless there is some form of castigation against prisoners who misbehave, the inmates will do little to observe the rules.
Of course, there are limits. The way prisoners are treated today is different from the way inmates were treated in the past. There is – or should be – a more humane way in their handling. But one can never depart from the fact that a prison is what it is – a place where people who caused harm to society are serving their dues.
In a day an age where society is coming up with terms which are more politically-correct than others which were used in the past, there have also been attempts to describe prisoners in what some thought were more acceptable ways. But then there are arguments against this idea as, after all, prisoners are prisoners.
In May this year, for example, The Times (of London) reported that prison officials in the UK were told that “they must stop calling inmates residents, clients or supervised individuals because it creates the wrong impression of criminals”.
They should stick to the word “prisoner”, as the increasing use of alternative language was sending mixed messages about how the State and wider society perceived criminals.
Victims
There is one important point which advocates for better conditions and improved rights for prisoners always seem to ignore – and this is the victims of crime.
People who have suffered the consequence of a crime – ranging from the murder of a loved one to the stealing of one’s possessions and all that there is in between – have to know that society is dealing with the offenders appropriately.
Police investigations and eventual prosecutions lead to decisions taken by the courts of law in a system that sees accused persons given every opportunity to defend themselves. This assures society that perpetrators are brought before a judge or a magistrate and, if found guilty, get the punishment that the law lays down.
Naturally, some arraignments end in convictions and others finish in acquittals and, since the system is run by humans, it is not perfect. Guilty offenders sometimes get scot free, innocent people sometimes end up behind bars. It is all a matter of evidence, technicalities and clever lawyers. And the man-in-the-street is often right to wonder why different prisoners get a different sentence for similar crimes.
Still, it is unfair to speak only of the rights of prisoners while ignoring the victims. It is a known fact that victims of crime often find it hard to overcome the trauma. For example, people who discover that their house has been ransacked continue to experience fear each time they are to return home, the place where they should be the most comfortable. Not to mention families who have a loved one taken away from them in a violent manner.
It is only when society in general, and in particular the victims of crime, are sure that justice has been meted out that some form of closure could be obtained.