Wednesday, December 14, 2022, as part of the efforts made by the Ministry of Justice to combat the scourge of prolonged pre-trial detention, Acting Minister Émmelie Prophète-Milcé, in the presence of her Director of Cabinet, the Director General and the Director of Judicial affairs, met with representatives of fifteen human rights organisations.

The objective was to create synergy between State authorities and civil society in order to better address the issue of prolonged, illegal and arbitrary preventive detention, which constitutes a real challenge for actors in the judicial system.

It was also an opportunity for the Minister to collect the comments of the representatives of these organizations on the latest administrative measures taken, ordering the government commissioners to require from the substitutes assigned to their Public Prosecutor's Office at least ten (10) indictments and acts charges per month, in proportion to the outstanding cases in the jurisdictions they lead https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-38284-haiti-justice-the-new-minister-of-justice-asserts-her-authority.html

"The hour is serious, the situation is chaotic It is not normal for litigants to be imprisoned without a judge deciding on their fate", lamented the Minister Prophet-Milcé pointing out in at the occasion that more than 80% of the prison population is affected by this scourge.

In response, human rights organizations expressed their satisfaction and made recommendations to the Minister, particularly regarding correctional and criminal hearings to be held as part of the program to relieve congestion in prisons, initiated by the Ministry of Justice to combat overpopulation.

Let's recall that in 2018 According to a ranking of the "World Prison Brief" Haiti occupied the dishonorable first place out of 205 countries, to have the most overcrowded prisons in the world https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-23478-haiti-flash-haiti-world-champion-of-prison-overcrowding.html

Read also about preventive detention in Haiti (partial list) :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-38284-haiti-justice-the-new-minister-of-justice-asserts-her-authority.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-36068-haiti-justice-imprisoned-at-15-on-a-false-accusation-he-spent-3-years-in-prison-without-trial.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-25697-haiti-justice-haiti-tops-the-list-of-people-imprisoned-without-conviction.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-25602-haiti-justice-74-of-detainees-in-haiti-have-never-been-tried.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-23929-haiti-justice-3-years-of-preventive-detention-for-a-stolen-phone.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-20317-haiti-justice-gustavo-gallon-harshly-judge-the-haitian-prison-system.html

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-13254-haiti-justice-89-of-the-inmates-of-the-national-penitentiary-in-prolonged-pretrial-detention.html

HL/ S/HaitiLibre