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The Portfolio Committee on Correctional Services is concerned about numbers of “unnatural deaths” at Correctional Centres.
 
To this end, the Committee has urged the Department to find way to come up with a solution to the problem. The Committee said this when the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services was briefing the Committee on its annual report for the financial year 2011/2012.
 
According to the Inspectorate’s annual report, 47 “unnatural deaths” were reported during the period under review/. The Inspectorate classified 16 of these as ‘cause unknown’ as the Department was unable to provide it with the details of what had caused the deaths.
 
The Committee said it was deeply concerned about the Inspecting Judge’s statement that because post-mortems were not prioritised, many deaths had to be classified as unknown. The Chairperson of the Committee, Mr Vincent Smith said it appeared as though excessive force was being used and could therefore have resulted in some of the deaths. He urged the Inspectorate to be frank in its assessment on whether inmates were being brutalised. “There is no justification for beating up inmates at any point; this amounts to abuse of power,” he said.
 
The Committee wants to see those who are allegedly involved in assaults of inmates being held to account.