Out of 1800 sentenced to imprisonment, only 600 behind the bars: Home Minister

Dr. Mohamed Jameel Ahmed, Minister of Home Affairs, has said today that out of 1879 convicted criminals sentenced to serve time in jail, only 621 people are behind the bars at present.

In a press conference held at Iskandharu Koshi today, the Minister said that while 1879 people were sentenced to imprisonment during the presidency of Mohamed Nasheed, from November 2008 until February 2012, 1258 persons were released without any records, and without any legal arrangements.

The Minister said that letting loose sentenced criminals into the society in such an irresponsible manner had caused crime rate in the Maldives to skyrocket during the last three years. He said that criminal justice implementation failure had subjected the whole society to dangers.

“During the last couple of years, criminals who are supposed to be behind bars have been released into the society without any appropriate system, and in doing so, the laws of the country have been kept aside”, said the Minister.

The Minister also said that the parole system designed to provide rehabilitation for criminals had been circumvented via the Second Chance program, and that Nasheed’s government released hundreds of criminals under the latter against the mechanism of parole. He also said that the Second Chance program would be discontinued, and the parole system reinvigorated and developed in the future.

The Minister also highlighted that the Second Chance program was used for political motives, to release criminals to serve political schemes, while sentenced individuals who deserved rehabilitation and coming-back to the society were left unattended.

“A list of criminals drawn up from within the President’s Office, irrespective of them being eligible for release under the principles of parole, was the basis on which criminals were released under the Second Chance program”, said Jameel.

Minister Jameel said that those who had been released under the Second Chance program, and also those who would be released in the future under parole, would all be monitored by the Parole Board. He also said that the Parole Board and Clemency Board would start functioning during the next week.

Mohamed Fayaz, State Minister of Home Affairs said in today’s press meeting that the Department of Penitentiary and Rehabilitation Services was already conducting a special operation to locate hiding criminals through a specially instituted team for the purpose. He said that 5 of these criminals were already found.

State Minister Fayaz also informed about plans to build a better prison facility, with a cement block factory, where inmates would be able to work and earn money during their times.