WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.
Original Post Date: 2002-05-22 Time: 16:08:12 Posted By: Jan
Source: Daily Mail & Guardian
SA’s crazy jails
Angela Quintal
A total of 20 692 awaiting trial prisoners were in South Africa’s overcrowded jails because they were unable to afford even low bail amounts, Prisons Inspecting Judge Johannes Fagan said on Tuesday.
This amounted to about 40% of the 55 000 awaiting trial prisoners in jail, he told the National Assembly’s correctional services committee on Tuesday.
Each of these accused had been found by a magistrate to pose no threat to the community.
Apart from the social cost of locking them up in what had been referred to as “universities of crime”, it was costing the country about R2-million a day to keep them behind bars, Fagan said.
“This is crazy,” he added.
However, there was also goods news in that it was the first time since 1995 that the number of awaiting trial prisoners in custody had shown a decline.
ACDP representative Steve Swart said in a statement the way forward was to apply restorative justice principles.
This was premised on the acceptance of guilt by the offender, and the payment of restitution to the victim where appropriate, or the rendering of community service, in cases where there was not a danger to public safety.
Justice Minister Penuell Maduna told the National Assembly’s justice committee he was pleased the numbers of awaiting trial inmates were decreasing.
“There are many creative things we are doing with the collaboration of Justice Fagan and a whole lot of other people.” Maduna said there was also a need to revisit the issue of pre-trial services.
“It’s at that point that we determine whether or not the person can afford bail and for how much.” Maduna said often people were given low bail and were too poor to afford to pay it.
It took R90 to R97 a day to maintain an awaiting trial prisoner. “In the first three days he has actually consumed more than the bail than he has to pay …” Maduna said.
However, it also depended on whether politicians and the community were also prepared to accept that “certain interventions were required to keep certain people out of our prisons”. – Sapa