BY KENJI SATO
Haymarket-based community activist group, Justice Action, has slammed proposals to set the classification of all NSW prisoners on life sentences to maximum security.
Brett Collins, the coordinator of Justice Action, voiced his criticisms in his submission to the NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into the Security Classification and Management of Inmates Sentenced to Life Imprisonment.
The inquiry will meet on the 23rd and 27th of November to discuss whether ‘lifers’ should continue to have the opportunity to have their security classifications reduced with ‘good behaviour’.
Twelve lifers have had their security classifications reduced to medium or minimum security over the past 30 years, and NSW Minister for Corrective Services David Elliot has told the inquiry that all lifers should have their security classifications set permanently to maximum.
But Brett Collins told City Hub that this would go against the purpose of prisons as a corrective service, and that it would reduce lifers to the status of ‘living dead’.
“Minister Elliot has proposed to the Inquiry the punishment and exclusion of prisoners more severe than ever before. The classification and treatment of lifers based on anything other than security offends many principles of the justice system,” he said.
“The classification should not be used as a punishment itself. That has never been the case until now. The idea of someone being held in a deliberately destructive high security is effectively torture. We spend taxpayers’ money to deliberately degrade people, and that runs counter to the idea of Corrective Services.”
The inquiry is examining whether rehabilitation programs should be offered to prisoners that have little or no prospect of release from custody, but Mr Collins said that access to rehabilitative programs should not be dependent on the prospect of release.
“Everyone should have a chance to develop and improve. It’s the whole philosophy of hope that’s part of a civilised community, or any religious community,” he said.
But Victims of Crime Assistance League Inc. NSW, a support group for victims of crime, said in their submission that rehabilitation services should be prioritised for prisoners towards the end of their sentence, not for those without a release date.
“Corrective Services NSW has only limited resources available to provide rehabilitation programs to prisoners as they progress through the custodial system,” they said in their submission.
“A life prisoner, who has no prospect of release, should therefore not take the place of someone who has prospects of release.”
The Homicide Victims’ Support Group told the inquiry that ‘lifers’ should not have their sentences lowered to anything below medium security.
“There is a common (and reasonable) perception among the families and friends of homicide victims that a life sentence is ‘for life’ and hence the conditions of the inmate will not change significantly over time,” they said in their submission.
“Reclassification from a higher to a lower classification may indicate to victims that an offender will be entitled to certain special privileges whilst serving their sentence. Particularly in the case of serious offenders, low security classifications are commonly perceived by victims as being irreconcilable with the extreme severity of the offences committed.”
The inquiry is also examining whether victims, including friends and family of the direct victims, should be consulted before changing the security classification of prisoners.
The Homicide Victims’ Support Group recommended to the inquiry that victims be allowed to have a say in the reclassification process.
“For a victim to be curtly informed that the offender has been reclassified from the ‘A2’ level to the ‘B’ level in a one-line letter or a short phone call without explanatory information of any kind, is meaningless. It is disempowering to receive information by way of incomprehensible bureaucratic jargon,” they said.
Six lifers also sent in submissions to the inquiry. One lifer argued that the involvement of victims would impact the judge and the affect the impartiality of the court process.
“Involving registered victims in the classification and management decision making process would prejudice such inmates and result in additional and unjust punishment to what is already regarded as a severe punishment being the loss of liberty,” the handwritten submission said.
In a separate submission, another lifer said that the prospect of reclassification would give lifers an incentive to behave well.
“There are those that believe lifers deserve absolutely nothing. Our punishment was to be locked away from our family, friends, and society for life. Giving hope gives us a reason to be well behaved, and also to not cause harm to other inmates, staff or ourselves. The chance of advancement gives us something to work towards. It gives us a reason to live.”
