MICHAEL AKINOLA
Suspected criminals heaved sigh of relief as Police officers, who brought them to various Courts in Lagos State for prosecution, were forced to return them to their different stations following the suspension of arraignment of criminals over prison congestion in the State.
P.M.EXPRESS reports that the Lagos State Judiciary has temporarily suspended the arraignment of suspects for various crimes following the revelation by the Lagos State Commissioner of Police, CP Owohunwa Idowu, that the prisons were over crowded and could not take more inmates due to lack of space.
Thus, the Judiciary acted swiftly and gave the directives through a memo and this caused serious confusion as the Investigation Police Officers, who brought suspects to Courts, which included Ejigbo, Isolo, Ogba, Ebute Metta etc., were forced to take their suspects back to the Police Station, which will soon be crowded as well based on the rate of crime in Lagos State.
P.M.EXPRESS investigation revealed that the Correctional Centres across the State were actually congested, which which led to the statement credited to the CP Owohunwa Idowu and the directive by the Judiciary.
Some prison officials and warders confirmed that the Correctional facilities were full to capacity and even stretched to the extent that a hall, which supposed to accommodate about 800 inmates were jampacked with over 3,000 inmates to the extent that it has compromised environmental health of those in custody.
“There is no space in the Correctional Centres. It will only take divine intervention for the inmates to survive because they had been filled beyond capacity and crowded” a Prison official stated.
P.M.EXPRESS findings revealed that there are some factors which may have contributed to the congestion of the correctional centers in Lagos State. The factors include the population, high rate of crime, stringent bail conditions which included tax payment, sureties inability to facilitate release of inmates due to financial demands by both the Court and prison officials.
Some legal practitioners who spoke to the P.M.EXPRESS reporter stated that they were not surprised about prison congestion based on their experiences in various Courts in the State.
One of the lawyers described the situation as contributive negligence from the Police, Court and prison officials, who obtain from litigants in the process and now it has backfired to the gain of criminals.
He explained that the complainant reports a matter to the Police, he will be asked to pay money to bring the matter before the Court. Thereafter, he will pay another money for files and documentation before the proper arraignment of suspects. Then he will have to pay N10,000 for each defendant before he or she will be taken by prison officials.
He explained that the second stage is the tedious release of the suspect from prison custody by the relations, which involved huge spending on Court officials, prosecutors and prison officials and in the process, the relations of the defendant will abandon him or her in custody.
As at the time of filing this report, it was not certain when the Judiciary will lift the suspension. But what is certain is that criminals will be granted bail at various Police cells due to congestion.