Prisoner says release contingent on bribe

A Trapaing Thlong prison officer in Kampong Cham was last week accused of demanding $150 to release a prisoner who had fully served his 10-year term, a charge the prison’s director rejected yesterday.

Inmate Kang Sopheap’s prison term for robbery officially ended on October 24, but he remains in custody because his family is unable to pay the $150 demanded by a prison official known as The, said Natural Resource and Wildlife Preservation Organization director Chea Hean, who helped Sopheap’s wife, Prak Savun, file a complaint.

“His family can’t afford it because they are poor,” Hean said. After receiving Savun’s complaint, the NGO wrote to the Interior Ministry’s General Department of Prisons on Wednesday, asking it to intervene. A copy of the letter was also sent to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights’ Cambodia office, Hean said.

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