All over the world, prisons are the cruelest places to be in. Even so, Ukraine’s penitentiaries are a far cry from world standards. The situation in 183 Ukrainian prisons beggars belief: the State Penitentiary Department says that 60 percent of these prisons are “satisfactory,” 10 to 20 percent get a good mark, while the housing conditions in the rest require immediate action.
Ukrainian prisons lack prison officers. Civic organizations report beatings in pre-trial prisons, human rights violations in detention and investigation facilities, lack of access to attorneys, and physical and mental abuse. The only positive sign is that, according to the State Penitentiary Department, the number of convicts has dropped by 22 percent in the last three years, from 190,000 in 2005 to 149,000 in 2008, thanks to legislative changes, amnesties, and presidential pardons. Ukraine has 20,000 murderers, 57,000 habitual offenders, and 1,400 people serving life sentences.
The two main problems that ex-convicts face after their release are lack of employment and restoring their family relationships. Psychologists say that some ex-convicts fail to readapt to life outside because most of them shift the blame to the state, friends, and relatives, rather than acknowledging their own guilt.
CONVICTS’ RIGHTS ARE BEING VIOLATED INCREASINGLY OFTEN
In order to determine what kinds of complaints inmates are submitting and what types of obstacles are preventing them from adapting to life outside, the International Renaissance Foundation and the Ukrainian-American Bureau for Human Rights Protection carried out a project in 2006 entitled “Monitoring Human Rights Protection of Inmates and Convicted Individuals in Ukraine” (the first study was conducted in 2000). Over 800 people were surveyed.
The survey showed that every convict has plans for the future and counts on the support of family members (29 percent), friends and acquaintances (20 percent), other prisoners released earlier (9 percent), and state institutions (9 percent). When they are set free, their expectations are met only by 50 percent. Tetiana Yablonska, a member of the Public Council at the State Penitentiary Department, explains that ex-convicts encounter biased attitudes from society: people simply do not believe them.
“The main problems that former prisoners encounter are excessive attention from the police (96 percent of respondents), biased attitudes on the part of employers (95 percent), education (93 percent), obtaining documents (83 percent), and restoring relationships with their families (77 percent). Most ex-convicts are fatalistic and apathetic about their fate and fail even to imagine how they can change their lives. They shift the responsibility for their future life on state institutions (57 percent), and only 25 percent are willing to exert themselves to achieve a better future. Among the measures that would assist their reintegration into society, respondents mentioned employment (34 percent), social assistance for released convicts (22 percent), and housing (17 percent).
Comparing the findings from the two surveys (2000 and 2006), experts say that prisoners have become more forthcoming in talking about police brutality. According to Yablonska, the last five years have seen a significant rise in the use of unlawful punitive measures and they have become systematic. Whereas in 2000, 72 percent of respondents mentioned police brutality, this figure rose to 81 percent in 2006. In fact, the most aggressive investigators are found in raion police departments and pre-trial prisons (mentioned by 55 percent of those surveyed).
During interrogations prisoners are threatened with violence to force them to make “required” confessions (45 percent), told they will be placed in cells with thugs (19 percent), proceedings will be instituted against their families (13 percent), and visitors, calls, and letters will be withheld (10 percent). Seventy-five percent of ex-convicts complained that prior to their first interrogation no one informed them about their right to remain silent without an attorney being present. In general, 75 percent of convicts had no legal defense in court. Yablonska is convinced that this situation speaks of the moral and legal degradation of the Ukrainian militia.
MOST MORAL BURNOUTS OCCUR HERE
According to Mykola Iltiai, first deputy head of the State Criminal- Executive Service of Ukraine, quite a few prisons earn their keep: inmates produce cars and agricultural implements, furniture, clothing, and items made of stone. In 2007 prisoners produced goods worth 420 million hryvnias, which led to a 29-percent increase in their salaries.
“While prisons where inmates serve their terms have their own production facilities that bring in additional funds, this problem is most acute for pre-trial prisons, which are subsidized only by the state budget,” said Iltiai. “On the one hand, the financing of the State Criminal-Executive Service is being improved; in 2008 we will receive nearly two billion hryvnias. However, these funds are not enough to improve the living conditions of all inmates. There is another problem in our penitentiary system, namely a lack of personnel, especially in those services that are responsible for protecting and monitoring prisoners. We need about 2,000 more employees.”
Psychologists believe that all those whose lives are linked to prisons end up with psychological burnout. They become exhausted, disillusioned- and aggressive. Most often this occurs among prison officers: in addition to their cruel treatment of convicts, they begin abusing alcohol and beating their wives and children.
“The reason for this is that, except for a small number of innocent persons who were unfortunate enough to end up in penitentiaries, the majority of convicts are hardly Ukraine’s finest citizens from the viewpoint of morality and psychology,” said Semen Hluzman, the head of the Ukrainian Psychiatric Association. “Sometimes defense attorneys forget that, in addition to their clients, they should take into account the state of their clients’ victims, who do not receive compensation from the state and are abandoned to their fate. They only satisfy the need to punish the culprits and that’s it. The situation of those who go to prison is no better: here they quickly adapt to the environment, and, worst of all, their fears become a habit. For people who live outside moral boundaries, this is the starting- point for turning into a professional criminal. Thus, the number-one problem in Ukraine today is organized crime. In dealing with these kinds of people, prison officers fall under their influence in one way or another.”
Today, 180 civic organizations are cooperating with prisons with the goal of helping prisoners to re-educate themselves and set up their lives after they are released. The Council of Churches is also contributing to these efforts. According to its head Grzegorz Draus, an insignificant number of churches and volunteers work in prisons in Ukraine in comparison with other countries. While six to seven civic associations work in English prisons, only one or two do this in Ukraine.
PENAL COLONIES ARE NOT THE SOLUTION
In order to change the horrific statistics and inmates’ living conditions, specialists are urging a reform of the entire penitentiary system. First of all, a special education institution needs to be set up, which would train prison personnel. It is very important to ensure that petty crimes do not entail imprisonment; rather, wrongdoers should be made to do community work. This way, experts claim, Ukraine will start implementing alternative punitive measures that many countries instituted a long time ago. Community work could include working in health care institutions or communal housing enterprises.
Improving morals requires support from civic organizations and clergymen. Draus says that in most countries prison chaplains spend an average of six to eight hours with inmates. In Ukraine visits from clergymen last two or three hours and take place only twice a week. This is far below what is needed because priests not only listen to inmates’ complaints and give advice; they also “open a door into the world outside prison bars.” Experts recommend getting social workers involved in helping inmates get connected with the outside world. For example, social workers help prisoners communicate with their families and friends through correspondence. Sometimes they ask neighbors to write at least one letter to the prisoner. Psychologists are convinced that all this helps inmates get rid of their aggressive behavior and become less of a threat to society.
COMMENTARY
Oleksandr BUKALOV, the head of the Donetsk Memorial Human Rights Organization and a member of the board of directors of the Memorial International Society:
“Ukraine’s penitentiary system requires urgent reforms, including legislative reform. We need to change the requirements set for inmates’ living conditions and elaborate a procedure that would allow them to file complaints. Because there is no such procedure, conflicts between inmates and prison administrations are most often resolved in an unlawful way. No less important is providing social security to prison officers: the law on the Criminal-Executive Service should stipulate the creation of specialized hospitals in all institutions within this system. Today only policemen have them.
“The lack of research centers is also making itself felt, and the problems of the State Criminal-Executive Service are not being studied in any significant way. Thus, the interpretation of a particular problem by the prison administration is taken to be the ultimate judgment because there is no research that would either confirm or refute this information.
“The public sector plays an important role here in that it can help by organizing legal consultations and psychological training, facilitating educational measures for prison personnel, and fostering international incarceration standards. But this is a distant prospect, as is the creation of a national control mechanism, which is envisaged by the UN Convention against Torture: a civic organization may be an element of this type of control through their surveys and monitoring.
“Some organizations make attempts along this line, but the system’s administration rejects them probably out of fear that their findings will contradict their statements. From time to time our organization studies inmates’ living conditions, and in doing so we have to overcome many obstacles. For example, sometimes members of supervisory commissions do not allow our experts into penitentiaries. This is not the only obstacle to establishing cooperation between prisoners and the community. In August 2007, for example, the Prosecutor-General’s Office instructed the State Penitentiary Department to allow civic organizations to visit prisons only on weekends.”
