Category: Remand
Mockery made of “innocent until proven guilty”
Commenting on the HM Inspectorate of Prisons thematic review of remand prisoners, Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, said:
People held on remand awaiting trial are innocent until proven guilty but the findings of this worrying review make a mockery of that principle. It’s clear that people remanded into custody are often held in worse conditions and receive less help and support than those convicted of a crime and serving a prison sentence.
An overuse of custodial remand has contributed to a system which in 2011 netted nearly 55,000 people, 11,500 of whom were subsequently acquitted and high numbers received a community penalty when their cases were finally heard in court.
The report reveals the impact of this rush to remand on an already over-stretched prison service. Remand prisoners must be held close to local courts and are often housed in large, overcrowded inner-city jails that are ill-equipped to meet their needs. Meanwhile sentenced prisoners are shipped from one prison to another, undermining efforts to reduce reoffending.
A disproportionate number of women, people from black and ethnic minorities and foreign nationals enter prison on remand. Remand prisoners have an increased risk of suicide and self harm and high numbers have a mental health, welfare, drug or alcohol problem. Despite these concerns, inspectors found that few remand prisoners were aware of the support services available to them and bail information was inadequate in many establishments.
Prison staff had a poor understanding of remand prisoners’ rights and entitlements and little was done to identify or address their specific needs and vulnerabilities. One remand prisoner told inspectors: ‘The staff treat us like criminals. The staff don’t even know who are remanded and who are sentenced.’
In an Olympic year, it is salutary to note that the excessive length and use of pre-trial detention is a major cause of overcrowding in prisons around the world and a key reason for the growth in the international prison population. While length of time on remand is better regulated in England and Wales than in many other countries, and numbers less excessive, it is clear that the government is failing to meet national and international obligations for the fair and proportionate treatment of people held in custody awaiting trial. The government has recently passed legislation to limit the unnecessary use of custodial remand. It should now act urgently to implement the Chief Inspector’s recommendations and ensure that treatment and conditions for people awaiting trial reflect their status as innocent until proven guilty.
Supported by the Persula Foundation, the Prison Reform Trust is working in consultation with the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) to produce clear and accurate information for people held on remand in England and Wales.
To read the full report from HM Inspectorate of Prisons click here
Press coverage:
the Guardian (comment)
The cruellest wait
Far from toughening up on bail, we should limit the use of jail for people on remand: they are, after all, innocent until proven guilty.
The Conservatives are planning to “get tough with the bail system”. But shadow justice minister Nick Herbert’s view that bail is too easily granted is contradicted by the shocking fact that each year in England and Wales many thousands of innocent people are remanded in prison. Thousands more are held for offences too minor for a jail term.
Each year around 54,000 people are remanded in prison awaiting trial. When their case reaches court, up to one in five will be acquitted, usually with no compensation. Up to half will be convicted and receive a community penalty because their offence was not considered serious enough to warrant imprisonment. Two-thirds of women who enter prison now do so on remand and there is a marked increase in the number of children sentenced to await trial in jail.
Magistrates typically reach decisions about whether to grant bail inside 10 minutes. Decisions can appear to the defendant to be the result of ticking the right box, rather than applying the explicit exceptions to the presumption in favour of bail individually and in detail. This often needless use of custody could be reduced simply by ensuring first that courts receive in good time the information they need, such as mental health assessments, to make sensible decisions about bail and remand and secondly that, for someone with no fixed abode, safe, supervised accommodation is available.
Meanwhile remand prisoners continue to be accommodated in some of the worst conditions in overcrowded local jails, conditions which were condemned by former chief inspector, Sir David Ramsbotham, in his report, Unjust Deserts. In Scotland, presumption of innocence status is recognised by reserving the best accommodation for those awaiting trial. In England and Wales many remand prisoners are held two to a cell designed for one, often with a convicted prisoner. They usually have to share a cramped space where they must sleep, eat their food and see their cell mate use the toilet in front of them. Some are locked up for 22 hours a day.
Many remand prisoners are vulnerable individuals with serious drug and mental health problems. Imprisoning them can have disastrous consequences. A combination of uncertainty, poor conditions and high levels of mental illness combine to increase risk and lead to a situation where 45% of prison suicides last year were committed by people awaiting trial. An email received by the Prison Reform Trust’s advice and information service attests to this:
I am very sad to hear the tragic news of one of my good friends death who died in prison on Saturday. He (like myself) had a history of drug abuse problems. I’ve known a lot of my friends who get out of prison say there is no support for their addictions when they get “locked up”. What I find hard to take is that he was on remand for minor shoplifting charges. He was a very nice person who had personal problems. He worked hard for most of his adult life until he lost his job a couple of years ago with his dependency problems hence getting in debt from a mortgage and having to move to be with his parents. Wouldn’t it be better to have urgent support for people like my friend who get remanded? Why are they locking people up for petty crime?
Nick Herbert’s determination to toughen up the law in relation to bail and remand runs counter to his party’s principled opposition to unlawful imprisonment and the extension of powers to detain people for up to 42 days without charge. What little is left in law of the Magna Carta plainly asserts the fundamental importance of presumption of innocence, trial by jury and habeas corpus. Rather than increase fear of crime by flagging up the few tragic cases in which someone on bail committed a serious offence, it would be more helpful for him to turn his attention to those held on remand who are, as it turns out, unjustly imprisoned.
Far from being goaded into further toughening of an already unfair process, the government should act urgently, both to improve the conditions for people awaiting trial in prison and to reduce any unnecessary use of imprisonment. Holding so many people who should be deemed innocent until proven guilty is unjust, uneconomic and puts undue pressure on an overstretched prison system.
This article appeared in Comment is free on the Guardian‘s website.
