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Report on Prison Conditions in Jamaica


Te Horizon Adult Remand Centre (HARC) was opened in 2002, having cost $440 million to construct, making it the island’s newest and most expensive penal facility. It lies just outside Central Kingston, to the west of the city, on Spanish Town Road, on a barren patch of land adjacent to May Pen Cemetery and opposite the deprived garrison area of Denham Town. Its modern white concrete walls, lined with razor wire, stand in stark contrast to the archaic structures at SCACC and TSACC. Once inside the front gate, one is ushered through a fenced outdoor corridor and over a small internal road into the main facility. Again in contrast to the other major high security facilities on the island, there is a considerable amount of unused space at HARC, both in the grounds of the institution (at the time of the visit there were no inmates exercising in the open air), and inside it.


Despite its name, as a result of overcrowding elsewhere in the island’s penal facilities, HARC houses several categories of inmate, including both female and male juvenile remandees, and a proportion of convicted inmates under sentence, in separate sections. However, its population remains predominantly made up of adult male remandees.39


While


significant numbers of pre-trial detainees remain incarcerated in local police lockups across the island, HARC now houses the vast majority of Jamaican remandees.40


In its short existence, the institution has not been without controversy. Shortly after opening in 2002, there were suggestions in the Jamaican national media that the construction of the institution had been substandard; and after a series of serious violent incidents at HARC in 2002, the Jamaican Government removed operational control of the centre from the Department of Correctional Services, and placed it in the hands of the Jamaica Defence Force (‘JDF’ – the Jamaican military).41


Further, the


centre has operated at around half of its intended capacity since it opened. Built to hold over 1000 pre-trial detainees, at the time of the visit its actual population was 616. Te two most notable features on entering HARC, are the amount of unused space and empty cells, and the incredible deterioration of facilities in the institution in such a short space of time.


39


At the time of the visit to HARC the muster was as follows: 506 male remanded, 29 convicted, 17 safe keeping, 29 male juveniles,


seven female juveniles, four special remandees, four appellants. 40


Pre-trial detainees make up 15% of Jamaica’s entire prison population. Tis compares with a figure of 15.7% in England and Wales, and places Jamaica 162nd in the world as regards pre-trial detention as a proportion of penal population as a whole. It is also of note that Jamaica has the lowest pre-trial detention rate in the Caribbean. Given the island’s crime rate and the pressures on its judicial system, this rate of detention is perhaps surprisingly low. Figures up-to-date as of October 2007, from the International Centre for


‘Soldiers in Charge – Horizon Remand Centre under Military Control – Superintendent sent on leave – Team to probe prisoner’s escape’, Jamaica Gleaner, 9th July 2002, http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20020709/lead/lead1.html


Prison Studies World Prison Brief, http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/law/research/icps/worldbrief/. 41


44


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