Corrections Ministry announces new prison for young offenders
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Georgia is planning to build a new juvenile detention facility for young offenders.
Today Georgia’s Acting Minister of Corrections Kakha Kakhishvili told Parliament that the Ministry of Corrections planned to build a new prison for young offenders aged 14-21 years, through the recommendation and support of the European Union (EU).
The Acting official told lawmakers of the plans while he presented his mandatory report as a nominee of Cabinet Minister. Now the legislative body must vote for a new Prime Minister and Cabinet in the new Government of Georgia.
Kakhishvili said in many cases it was not appropriate or right to send a young person to an adult prison the moment they turned 18, and other ways of punishment were better for youth offenders.
He stressed the new detention facility would offer a range of programs that would support the young offenders to be rehabilitated and re-socialise easily when they left the penitentiary institution.
Lawmakers listened to Acting Minister of Corrections Kakha Kakhishvili today. Photo by Ministry of Corrections' press office.
When Kakhishvili made his report in front of Parliament, he also announced the Ministry of Corrections planned to offer a new form of pre-trial detention that would better serve offenders in Georgia.
The Acting high official said only two forms of pre-trial detention were currently operating in Georgia; pre-trial detention or release on bail.
Kakhishvili said the Ministry of Corrections intended to offer an alternative form – pre-trial probation - to Parliament for confirmation.
In other countries pre-trial probation is a court-approved agreement or contract between the prosecutor and defendant before a trial or a guilty plea.
Under such an agreement, a defendant is placed on probation, in the care of a probation officer for a certain period of time and under certain conditions before he is convicted of any crime. Probation may be supervised or unsupervised.
How do authorities supervise inmates on home detention?
Today a group of diplomatic corps and media representatives saw first-hand how the Ministry remotely controlled juvenile inmates from the newly established Electric Monitoring Centre of the National Probation Agency.
Life imprisonment for juveniles is now prohibited in Georgia. The country has a new Juvenile Justice Code that meets international standards.
Georgia is establishing a special Juvenile Justice Code for people aged 18 and under so the country can provide a judicial system that meets European standards and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
All criminal cases in Georgia involving minors will soon be handled by police officers, investigators, prosecutors and judges who specialise in juvenile offending.
Georgia's future Cabinet have today introduced their agenda for the next four years, with the main goal to improve the welfare of the country.
This year more juveniles were offered preventative sentences rather than prison terms, says Georgia’s Minister of Justice Thea Tsulukiani.
Today Georgia’s Holy Trinity Church in capital Tbilisi hosted an art exhibition of works created by Georgian female convicts and by those who have already served their sentences.
From now on the Ministry of Corrections will send convicts for different crimes in separate cells.
Open Society Georgia has released a report on how Georgia has fought torture and inhuman treatment in prisons over the course of the last five years.
A report of the Council of Europe (CoE) and the European Union (EU) joint project - Human Rights and Healthcare in Georgian Prisons and Penitentiary Facilities - has praised "tangible progress” made in better healthcare in the prison system.
The Georgian Justice Minister Thea Tsulukiani has evaluated the outcomes of a rehabilitation program initiated by her five years ago, titled Rehabilitation and Resocialization Program for Former Prisoners.
The latest Council of Europe survey for mortality rates amongst inmates ranks Georgia as the fifth lowest.
The Council of Europe (CoE) has released a report about the 10-year trend in European prisons, which provides the findings about Georgian prisons between 2005 and 2015.
The statistics of 2008 read 445 inmates per 100,000 inhabitants in Georgia, while the figure was 252 per 100,000 in 2018. CoE says that the number of inmates in the Georgian prisons was increasing until 2012 [under the United National Movement], with 516 inmates per 1000,000 in 2012.