Special prison courts to speed up delayed sentences

www.vheadline.com Posted: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Attorney General Isaias Rodriguez, Ombudsman German Mundarain, Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ) president, Ivan Rincon and Interior & Justice (MIJ) Minister General (ret.) Lucas Rincon Romero have met to seek solutions to drastic prison conditions.

Speaking after the meeting, Ombudsman Mundarain says the State will ask international bodies for funding to implement a definite solution to the problem.

As for prisoners' main complaint over delayed legal processes, Mundarain says meetings have taken place in several States between leading judges, state attorneys, public defense lawyers and ombudsmen to create mechanisms aimed at speeding up the legal process ... 9,000 prisoners are said to be still waiting for a sentence to be passed.

Special courts will be set up inside jails as one solution.

The government denies charges that prisoners have resorted to eating cats and dogs declaring that the meals situation is already taken care of and that the media has blown the food situation out of all proportion.

Countries like the USA and the UK have funded legal system and prison reforms since the last Caldera administration but not much has been published about the results.