…calls for prison reformation
The Ogun State Chief Judge, Justice Mosunmola Dipeolu, has granted amnesty to 26 inmates awaiting trial in some of the state’s prisons, using the prerogative power of the state’s Chief Judge.
She undertook the gesture during a three-day tour of five prison formations across the three senatorial districts of the state, aimed at assessing the state of the prisons and their inmates.
Dipeolu, during the tour, said the second-quarter prisons’ jail delivery was aimed at decongesting the formations after reviewing inmates’ cases, noting that she was compelled to grant amnesty to inmates with no case files, and others on medical grounds, asking them “to go and sin no more”.
“The inmates were released with a view to decongesting the prisons and the exercise is in accordance with the service of the law under the custody act. I want to appeal to the released inmates to be of good behaviour, so that they do not return to the prison,” Dipeolu urged.
She, however, appealed to the government to build more prison formations across the state, in order to decongest some prisons, noting that all efforts being made to decongest the prisons across the state had proved abortive.
“As you can notice here that more people are coming in on daily basis, the crime rate is also very high in our society and we all know that, that is why I am recommending that more prison formations should be built to accommodate criminals; we can only release those that are not supposed to be here”, Dipeolu said.
The CJ added that some prisons had doubled its capacity which was not good for the inmates’ health, the society and the environment at large, saying that the courts were trying their best to decongest these prisons through the prisons’ courts, intervention week and jail delivery exercise, yet most of the prisons were still congested.
She lamented the level of prisons congestion across the state, stating that New Abeokuta Prison, Oba, was the only prison that was not highly congested because of its relatively new and large capacity, unlike Ibara Prison, which has the capacity of housing 510 inmates, but now haas about 1,164 inmates.
She called on government at all levels to find a lasting solutions in decongesting the prisons across the state, as it was unwholesome for leaving prisons congested, so as to also avoid unnecessary jail break by the inmates.
Dipeolu disclosed that two inmates were set free at Sagamu Prison, nine at Ijebu-Ode, three at Ilaro, while five and seven were released at the new Abeokuta Prison, Oba, and Ibara Prisons, respectively.
