Bangkok Rules E-Bulletin Women in the criminal justice system
September 2017
Welcome to Penal Reform International's quarterly Bangkok Rules E-Bulletin, a round-up of news and developments from PRI and others around the world on women in the criminal justice system and the implementation of the UN Bangkok Rules. The views expressed in the news items are not necessarily those of PRI.
The UN Bangkok Rules are a set of standards adopted by the UN General Assembly in December 2010, which supplement existing standards for the treatment of prisoners by addressing the specific needs of women in the criminal justice system. For more information on the Rules see PRI's Short guide.
Since 2015, PRI has been conducting a pioneering, multifaceted projectfocused on the experiences of women completing non-custodial sentences – specifically community service orders and probation orders – in Kenya, and the investigation of how best to adopt a gender-sensitive approach.
PRI has now published new gender-sensitive resources, including a model for reform, a training workshopon community sanctions for women offenders and guidelines for social investigations and pre-sentence reports.
Two new blogson a gender-sensitive approach to community sanctions are also available:
Omar Phoenix Khan, who carried out the external evaluation of the project, outlines eight key points to considerwhen implementing a gender-sensitive approach.
PRI’s Annual Report 2016, which outlines the impact of our work and achievements over the past year, is now online. Highlights of our global promotion of the Bangkok Rules in 2016 included:
A pilot project with partner Kenya Probation Service was implemented to develop a gender-sensitive approach to the delivery of community sanctions (see above).
In Georgia, monitoring visits were conducted to the women’s prison to observe the extent of compliance with the Bangkok Rules. The subsequent report included recommendations to judges and parole board members.
In Algeria, we delivered a training workshop for the National Centre for Human Rights, which is responsible for monitoring places of detention; this included an update on the Bangkok Rules.
PRI's Regional Director in Sub-Saharan Africa calls for improved conditions for female prisoners in Uganda
Photo: training for prison administrators in Uganda on the UN Bangkok Rules
Doreen N Kyazze, PRI's Regional Director in Sub-Saharan Africa, has called on the Ugandan government to take gender into consideration in detention facilities to ensure that the specific needs of women prisoners are met. Her comments came after a two-day training course for prison administrators on human rights and sensitisation on the UN Bangkok Rules held in Kampala, organised by the Uganda Prisons Service.
In this blog, County Probation Director Paul King’e answers PRI's questions on how a gender-sensitive approach to community-based programmes can help female offenders in Kenya.
In this blog, Omar Phoenix Khan of Justice Focus outlines key points to remember when implementing a gender-sensitive approach to non-custodial sentences. Omar carried out the external evaluation of PRI's pilot project in Kenya.
As part of PRI's expert blog series, Barbara Owen, an international expert in the area of women and imprisonment, examines practical solutions to improve women's safety in prisons and highlights gendered harms of imprisonment.
OTHER REPORTS, RESOURCES AND ARTICLES
UN report: discrimination against women can lead to overcrowding and over-incarceration
A report by the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (OHCHR), on Non-discrimination and the protection of persons with increased vulnerability in the administration of justice, in particular in situations of deprivation of liberty and with regard to the causes and effects of overincarceration and overcrowding, included some discussion about women, as follows:
Impact of discrimination on overcrowding/over-incarceration: The report notes that there is some legislation that predominantly affects women resulting in their over-incarceration. Criminalisation of petty offences can lead to over-incarceration of women (and children), as do drug-related offences (paras 6, 7, 13 and 14).
Drug policies and women (para 13)
Non-custodial measures for women (para 28)
Biases (para 18)
Legal aid (para 22)
Protective detention (para 23)
Overcrowding impacts people with vulnerabilities
Insufficient female staff members (para 34)
Specific health needs (para 41)
Disadvantages faced by ethnic minority women in the criminal justice system
This article reviews the ways that women of colour in the US are specifically targeted in drug cases and are subject to abuse or assault by police officers.
Take a look at PRI's resources on why criminal justice reform is essential to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals, including Goal 5: achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.
Who's watching out for the kids when women go to jail?
An investigation by the Dallas Morning News says that children of women in prison are being left alone and vulnerable, with no one in the criminal justice system responsible for the safety of children whose mothers go to jail.
UK Supreme Court ruling on female offenders
The UK Supreme Court has ruled that female offenders are 'directly discriminated' against because of a severe lack of approved premises for women in the UK, which often sees them placed far from their homes and families.
The US-based VERA Institute for Justice (US) has published a report – Overlooked: Women and Jails in an Era of Reform – examining existing research on women in jail who represent the fastest growing correctional population in the US. The report explores how jail can deepen the societal disadvantages women face, and provides insight into what drives women’s incarceration and ways to reverse the trend.
The UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Agnes Callamard, has issued a report urging states to review laws, criminal procedures and judicial practices to ensure that they take full account of women’s backgrounds, and to repeal laws that result in the disproportionate detention of women. The Special Rapporteur also urges states to implement fully and expeditiously the UN Bangkok Rules and establish appropriate gender-specific conditions of detention.
A new study by the US Bureau of Justice Statistics shows a striking disparity between incarcerated men and women. Although women make up only seven per cent of the prison population, 66 per cent of women in prison reported having a history of a mental disorder, almost twice the percentage of men. One in five women in prison had recently experienced serious psychological distress, while one in seven men had.
One of the BBC's 2017 '100 Women' – 100 influential and inspirational women from around the world – is Miriam, who was imprisoned for theft after she pleaded guilty because of a misunderstanding and a lack of a translator. She took twice-weekly literacy classes while in prison and, following her release, she has built her own business and is teaching children in her community to read and write.
Women's Transitions from Prison: The Post-Release Experienceby Rosemary Sheehan and Chris Trotter presents original research undertaken with Corrections Victoria, Australia. It examines the effectiveness of services and programmes that women access in prison and after release, and the impact of this on successful reintegration into the community and on other trends such as reoffending.
Law 9361 recently reformed the court registry in Costa Rica, allowing people with criminal convictions to eliminate their criminal records from the registry more quickly, based on criteria that takes into account sentencing length and the offence committed. This commentary reviews the potential impact of this reform.
Deficient medical services and lack of personal hygiene prevail. Prison authorities fail to have regard to the special needs of the disabled and women (concluding observations available only in Spanish).
Since 2015, six model prisons across Thailand have adopted the UN Bangkok Rules. The Department of Corrections and the Thailand Institute of Justice have been working together to implement the Rules at both mixed and all-female correctional facilities, with one of the aims being to reduce the number of women prisoners.
The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics (2016) showed a 42 per cent increase of imprisonment rates over the last 10 years for women, compared to a 24 per cent increase for men. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women make up around 34 per cent of women incarcerated, despite comprising only two per cent of the adult female population. This ABC Australia episode features a discussion by experts and former prisoners of why this is happening, and explores the unintended consequences for the women and their families, especially their children.
Do you have new publications or resources to share on women and criminal justice?
We encourage you to send us any new materials, feedback, news items, blogs, etc. to share with this network of people interested in women and the criminal justice system. Please send to: info@penalreform.org
