Rivers CJ Grants Pardon To 10 Inmates

The Chief Judge of Rivers State, Justice Simeon Amadi has granted pardon and discharged 10 inmates in Port Harcourt Maximum Correction Centre, who were awaiting trial in the state.
The pardoned inmates include those who were considered in two categories of alleged serious offences that have spent more than 10 years in custody against the required sentence years; and those considered as minor cases, who have spent more than their required five sentence years, if convicted as required by law.
Out of the 10 released, eight inmates are of categories of those considered as serious offenses, while two inmates are of the minor cases.
Justice Amadi directed the Office of the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) not to file any case for prosecution without relevant information on the matter due to the discrepancies noticed in the process of releasing the inmates with regards to lack of information on their case files.
According to him, “very soon, the Judiciary shall come out with directives that will make DPP not to file any matter that they are not sure of in other to avoid keeping inmates in custody too long without proper information on the matter.
“Imagine one of the inmates has spent more than 10 years in custody without any information or proper documentation of the case in which he was remanded for. This, among other administrative policies, we will adopt in addressing the challenges of prison congestion”, he stated.
The state chief judge said that from Monday, three magistrates would return to the correctional centre to look at the minor cases in order to release those inmates who have spent the mandatory committal years of sentence but have spent more than the stipulated years in custody.
He, however, directed the management of the Correctional Centre in the state to work out modalities for the effective utilization of the opportunity provided so that the prison can be decongested.
He assured that the exercise would be carried out again during the beginning of the new legal year, probably in the first week of September, saying that the exercise would be purely based for the cases considered to be in the category of serious offenses.
Justice Amadi, however, charged the released inmates to be of good behaviour and not go back to their former lifestyle that brought them to custody, saying that they may not be lucky next time.
Also speaking, the state Comptroller of Corrections, Nigerian Correctional Service, Mr Alex Oditah, thanked the state chief judge for the exercise, adding that it would help to decongest the custody.

By: Akujobi Amadi