Contraband in prisons
…as Prison Director talks tough on smuggling
As the Guyana Prison Service (GPS) in collaboration with the Guyana Police Force (GPF) work to clamp down on the smuggling and attempted smuggling of contraband into the several penitentiaries, some five prison officers who are suspected to be in collusion with the criminals have been relieved of their duties.
This is according to Prison Director Gladwin Samuels on Friday during an interview with media operatives.
He explained that these prison officers have been implicated in the May 1, 2018 incident where a parcel containing suspected cannabis was thrown into the Lusignan Prison holding bay area.
“…We also have five officers who have been interdicted from duty following the May 1 matter at the Holding Bay where our CCTV footage would have revealed that a number of what is suspected to be contraband items were thrown into the Holding Bay facility… Based on the reviews we would have conducted, it is clear that the officers were working in collusion with each other in order to facilitate the movement of the suspected contraband into the prison,” he explained.
Samuels further disclosed that legal advice has been sought from the Director of Public Prosecutions.
“I am advised that the Police have sent for legal advice, but they have not received such yet. Hopefully this will be soon, and I trust that the necessary actions will be taken against these officers so that the message which we have been trying to send all the years, will be clear, that persons who are bent or are involved in such practices will not be condoned,” he said.
Nevertheless, the Prison Director claimed the upsurges in occurrences of these incidents are not as a result of poor management.
“It is quite disturbing, it is quite embarrassing to have to face these situations on a daily basis, but this is not a situation where by the prison administration is failing to act. The reality of it is, despite we would do vetting and so forth, these prison officers are drawn from communities…and from some strange reason, despite they’re given their dos and don’ts, they allow themselves to be sucked into the financial gains that these activities can bring you,” he said.
On Wednesday last, two parcels containing narcotics, 18 packs of cigarettes, a quantity of zip locks, 12 packs of bamboo and a plastic bottle containing El Dorado five-year-old rum was found in close proximity to a chicken pen at the New Amsterdam Prison after being thrown over the fence of the said prison.
Additionally, on July 3, 2018, a man attempted to throw a parcel containing 1002 grams of narcotics, a large quantity of tobacco leaves, four cellphones without SIM cards, one charger, one earpiece and 33 packets of Bristol cigarettes into the Lusignan prison but dropped the items when he was noticed by prison security and made good his escape.
On June 23, 2018, a man also managed to evade security at the Lusignan Prison after throwing a large quantity of cannabis and other items over the fence.
Those are just among the most recent instances of smuggling at the holding facilities.
As such, Samuels noted that while CCTV facilities are available, additional security measures will soon be put in place within the various penitentiaries.
“We are putting additional security measures in place… Our 2018 budget is catering for improvement of our CCTV systems. The system we have at the holding bay…is quite modern…We just got the approval for the spending of the 2018 allocations so within a matter of weeks, the contractor will be on the ground to enhance the CCTV coverage at the Holding bay. We will also be enhancing the New Amsterdam prison and the Mazaruni Prison which has become somewhat out dated, will be fully overhauled,” he posited.
Ever since the July 9, 2017 Camp Street prison fire, which resulted in prisoners being transported to several jails countrywide, the smuggling and attempted smuggling of contraband has become prevalent.
Just last week, the Government had announced that they intend to have scanners implemented at the entrances of each prison.
This, Samuels revealed, will be looked at even closer when representatives of an overseas company which manufactures scanners for prisons visit Guyana in September.
