Surge in women being locked up

[webfact]

Surge in women being locked up
Pratch Rujivanarom
The Nation

Overcrowding in women's prisons must be tackled first, researchers say

BANGKOK: -- RESEARCHERS at a forum on reform of women's prisons presented five policies yesterday on how to transform the "unpleasant conditions" in these jails into caring communities.

The forum entitled "Proposals to reform the female prison: reality and imagination" aimed, firstly, for inmates to return to society as good citizens.

The five proposals submitted were: solve overcrowding, promote basic healthcare and good living conditions for prisoners, train warders to understand gender sensitivity and respect prisoners as people, prepare them for parole, and return foreign prisoners to their home countries.

Kittiya Ashawanichakul, head of the researchers group, said the first thing that must be done was to reduce the problem of overcrowding in the jails.

"Crowded conditions caused female inmates to live in unpleasant and unsanitary conditions, leading to many physical and mental health problems," Kittiya said. "Healthcare must also be improved as some jails for females have only one nurse to take care of all the inmates. I think the Public Health Ministry should cooperate with the Corrections Department on this issue."

She said warders' roles needed reforming too.

"The warders should be well-trained to look after female inmates. The use of disciplinary power must be reduced and the relationship between prison officers and prisoners be more [equal,]" she explained.

In preparing prisoners for living in the outside world, Kittiya said the Justice Ministry must work more with the community to strengthen both the justice and probation systems.

For the final proposal, she advised the country to take a proactive approach in dealing with other countries to exchange criminals.

Researcher Napaporn Havanon said that by implementing these proposals, prisons would change from institutions that reduce the human dignity of inmates to caring communities where a prisoner's values were respected.

Napaporn pointed out that among the major problems within prisons were the ways that prisoners were monitored and live to a strict timetable which makes them feel lowly, ashamed and unvalued. This lead them to disrespect themselves and others.

Corrections Department director Vitaya Suriyawong said the penal system was planned to accommodate a ratio of only five per cent of total inmates being women. But the ratio of female prisoners to male inmates was 14.5 per cent.

The department said Thailand had 47,623 women prisoners in February, which is the fourth highest in the world and the most per head of population.

"The number of new female prisoners is increasing every year; we cannot accommodate them all properly. Also, only 15 per cent were convicted of serious crimes and should be in jail - the other 85 per cent were accused of minor crimes," Vitaya said.

The discussion forum at Rama Gardens Hotel Bangkok was held by the Thai Association of Population and Social Researchers, Mahidol University and the Thai Health Promotion Foundation.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/new/2015/03/24/national/images/30256610-01_big.jpg


-- The Nation 2015-03-24

[chooka]

Try giving them private rooms with en suite, television, internet, chef to specially cater to thier dietary and religious requirements, state of the art gyms and sporting facilities, cable t.v, the opportunity to obtain 100% free university degrees, week end leave to go out with family and friends and pay them to be there. Works in Australia the courts have to hand out bonds as the jails up booked out in advance. All paid for by the law abiding citizens who will never have the same privileges.

[Robby nz]

Well women do want equality, same prison conditions as men seems fair.

[issanaus]

The OP addresses the problem from the wrong end addressing why people end up in prison makes more logical sense than trying to address overcrowding, correctional programs and human rights in prisons. The reality is that in most societies there are more votes on being tough on crime than on addressing issues that are the root cause of the behaviours of incarcerations. In most situations the economic cost of prevention is less than the cost of incarceration.

This is not advocating that crime should not be take seriously - in Thailand the biggest problem is crime in all its forms including corruption, property crime and assaults on people. Where there is a need is to separate out what is a crime and what is a health problem. The best example of this is the drug trade where the supply side is clearly a crime against venerable individual as well as the population as a whole. Yes there is an issue in the cross over caused by the supplier/users. One of the things that the current PM has done is to state this and suggest that there needs to be different treatment for users and suppliers.

[ezzra]

Could it be that feminism caught up late in Thailand, or that the women have seen their men

counterparts get away with many crimes and just want to give a go, or best scenario yet has

to do with the ease and proliferation of the get rich quick drug's trade, imho, it the later rather

than the former...

[rametindallas]

From my personal experience, many of these women committed crimes of passion. Thai women can become extremely possessive and when they catch their boyfriend/husband cheating, as they almost inevitably will, they get their revenge. I don't think most of them are a danger to the community at large. Too bad the government doesn't set up work farms in the country-side where the air is clean, the skies are open, and there is good manual work to occupy the mind. Their production would provide for decent living quarters/food/medical care and also, I would think the rehabilitation rate would be quite positive. I hate to see a harsh prison environment rob them of their femininity. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm making a lot of assumptions on my presumptions.

[issanaus]

From my personal experience, many of these women committed crimes of passion. Thai women can become extremely possessive and when they catch their boyfriend/husband cheating, as they almost inevitably will, they get their revenge. I don't think most of them are a danger to the community at large. Too bad the government doesn't set up work farms in the country-side where the air is clean, the skies are open, and there is good manual work to occupy the mind. Their production would provide for decent living quarters/food/medical care and also, I would think the rehabilitation rate would be quite positive. I hate to see a harsh prison environment rob them of their femininity. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm making a lot of assumptions on my presumptions.

Most of my experience with prisons is in Australia not Thailand but in relation to the post I would agree that the boyfriends/husbands are a major factor in the increasing percentage of females as a percentage of the prison population. What I would suggest from my experiences with Thai people is that Thai women are increasingly bearing the cost of the total lack of responsibility of Thai males in relation to families leaving the women to carry the cost. Poverty, isolation, boredom and psychological result from the burden of being sole parents. This both makes them a prime target for drugs as well as leaving them with the higher prison rates that are associated with poverty.

[greenchair]

Prisons are supposed to rehabilitate.

Not dehabilitate.

[NickJ]

If anything there is a surge in using the word surge.

[ToddinChonburi]

From my personal experience, many of these women committed crimes of passion. Thai women can become extremely possessive and when they catch their boyfriend/husband cheating, as they almost inevitably will, they get their revenge. I don't think most of them are a danger to the community at large. Too bad the government doesn't set up work farms in the country-side where the air is clean, the skies are open, and there is good manual work to occupy the mind. Their production would provide for decent living quarters/food/medical care and also, I would think the rehabilitation rate would be quite positive. I hate to see a harsh prison environment rob them of their femininity. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm making a lot of assumptions on my presumptions.

You have some good points, many women are also used by men to traffic there drugs and they get to sit in prison while there boy toy continues with a new girl. What ever happened to road crews cleaning the ditches ? OH yes the Liberals.

[TooPoopedToPop]

If anything there is a surge in using the word surge.

...and the people using the word usually have an agenda of their own.

[TooPoopedToPop]

From my personal experience, many of these women committed crimes of passion. Thai women can become extremely possessive and when they catch their boyfriend/husband cheating, as they almost inevitably will, they get their revenge. I don't think most of them are a danger to the community at large. Too bad the government doesn't set up work farms in the country-side where the air is clean, the skies are open, and there is good manual work to occupy the mind. Their production would provide for decent living quarters/food/medical care and also, I would think the rehabilitation rate would be quite positive. I hate to see a harsh prison environment rob them of their femininity. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm making a lot of assumptions on my presumptions.

You have some good points, many women are also used by men to traffic there drugs and they get to sit in prison while there boy toy continues with a new girl. What ever happened to road crews cleaning the ditches ? OH yes the Liberals.

Ah the good old days...

Chain gangs in the American South, the Gulag Archipelago in the Soviet Union.

[rametindallas]

From my personal experience, many of these women committed crimes of passion. Thai women can become extremely possessive and when they catch their boyfriend/husband cheating, as they almost inevitably will, they get their revenge. I don't think most of them are a danger to the community at large. Too bad the government doesn't set up work farms in the country-side where the air is clean, the skies are open, and there is good manual work to occupy the mind. Their production would provide for decent living quarters/food/medical care and also, I would think the rehabilitation rate would be quite positive. I hate to see a harsh prison environment rob them of their femininity. Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm making a lot of assumptions on my presumptions.

You have some good points, many women are also used by men to traffic there drugs and they get to sit in prison while there boy toy continues with a new girl. What ever happened to road crews cleaning the ditches ? OH yes the Liberals.

Ah the good old days...

Chain gangs in the American South, the Gulag Archipelago in the Soviet Union.

Excepting in Hollywood movies (my favorite being Cool Hand Luke) working on a 'chain gang' or the prison farm was voluntary and gave the inmates an opportunity to escape the claustrophobia of a cell. I've met people who've worked on prison farms and it is not slave labor as Hollywood portrays it. Fresh air, sunshine, and manual labor are good for the body as well as the soul. I grew up in the US Deep South during the 1950s/60s and seeing prisoners cleaning the trash and cutting weeds on the side of the road was common; they weren't chained. Please don't try to portray it as something it wasn't.

[NeilSA1]

There are one or two places where the women prisoners were taught how to become masseuses, and they then earn some income (under controlled conditions) whilst being prisoners.

[chooka]

There are one or two places where the women prisoners were taught how to become

masseuses,

and they then earn some income (under controlled conditions) whilst being prisoners.

aren't happy endings banned?

[EyesWideOpen]

Prisons are supposed to rehabilitate.

Not dehabilitate.

Tough call. My position is that people should fear going to prison,

and then it would fulfill its role as a deterrent. Not sure about the

numbers, but I suspect a lot of these women were duped into

being drug mules by scum dealers.

[godden]

There are one or two places where the women prisoners were taught how to become masseuses, and they then earn some income (under controlled conditions) whilst being prisoners.

with happy endings?

[Robby nz]

Prisons are supposed to rehabilitate.

Not dehabilitate.

Or is prison given out as punishment for a crime ?

[15Peter20]

If anything there is a surge in using the word surge.

A splurge on the urge to surge?

[Bakseeda]

Try giving them private rooms with en suite, television, internet, chef to specially cater to thier dietary and religious requirements, state of the art gyms and sporting facilities, cable t.v, the opportunity to obtain 100% free university degrees, week end leave to go out with family and friends and pay them to be there. Works in Australia the courts have to hand out bonds as the jails up booked out in advance. All paid for by the law abiding citizens who will never have the same privileges.

Well Chooka, that is certainly not Victoria you are talking about.. Barwan, Lodden, Port Phillip.... for sure no internet in any of those jails.. and prisoners have to work to get paid a pittance.... and in Victoria only in 2008 did they bring in a Human Rights Bill, and before this a person could be kept in prison for up to 5 years without trial... so much for Habeas Corpus.... and weekend leave to go out with family and friends is only for peoples who are at the end of a long sentence and to allow them to settle more easily back in to society. Go ask Paul Steven Haigh

[BSJ]

Commit a crime, get caught, get court, go to jail and not get TV, special food, the company of other criminals or visits from relatives. A concrete cell with one blanket and one meal a day. No talking, no light, no cigarettes, no time outside the cell. There would be a prison doctor....to sign death certificates if prisoner died. And people say I would be tough on the prisoners if I was the warden!

[elgordo38]

If anything there is a surge in using the word surge.

Last time I heard this word was the "surge" in Iraq. It really produced nothing.

[Shiver]

For Thailand at least (and I suspect true for many other countries also), I am told that the percentage of inmates are in the region of >70% (and growing) related to drugs.

I think people getting caught out don't actually believe it will ever happen to them, so it's not a very effective deterrent for them. Also they feel they are so smart that they can out class the system (much like gamblers feeling lucky until they lose the house to mafia). I've seen too close to home for comfort where someone starts selling because it's easy money, then gets caught, and does a deal where they 'dob in'/grass at least 2 people per month for the police to pursue, and eventually they run out of names, resorting to reporting innocents to make their quota, or suddenly making themselves the new best friends of a potential 'fall guy' but still end up going down themselves anyhow once their usefulness has been exploited. I also have a strong suspicion that the source of their drugs is the same as the pursuants of the pushers/mules, so they know exactly where and when to accost them. If ever there was a reason to "just say no" this is it.

The big news is 756 officers capturing 3Kg of Kratom (legal produce in many countries). 3Kg of non dried leaves could at a push be classed as personal use!

Meanwhile...

People are dying or having the lives of themselves and families destroyed by being on the periphery of 'hard' drugs, whether users or logistics pawns.