LADOM plans to provide legal assistance to convicts

The convicts from those 11 penitentiaries of Moldova will benefit from free of charge legal assistance provided by the League for Defence of Human Rights of Moldova (LADOM) by means of five regional centres, President of the organisation Paul Strutzescu told a news conference on Monday, August 20. The quoted source says the situation in the penitentiaries is deplorable. According to Strutzescu, the insufficient financial sources compromised the concept on the reformation of the penitentiary system, started a few years ago by the authorities. The insignificant positive changes are due to the insistence of the international bodies and are mainly related to the detention conditions of minors. The adult convicts say that they do not have enough food, water and medicaments. The sums coming from the budget are enough only for a half of the necessities of penitentiary institutions. However, the majority of complaints made by the convicts are not directly related to the financial means, but to the attitude of the persons working in prisons. The convicts say that their right to private mail is being violated and they are incarcerated without legal grounds, Strutzescu emphasised. According to him, a positive fact is that at present the convicts, excepting several before-trial detention institutions, are not maltreated as it happened before. The jurists of LADOM will periodically visit the prisons of the country, as to examine and solve the petitions of the convicts. The visits will be announced one day before via the local radio stations, in order to inform the convicted persons. Also, the jurists will provide legal consultancy to the relatives of these persons at the following addresses: Chisinau, Vasile Alecsandri Street 13, Bureau 25 (for the convicts of the penitentiaries from Rezina, Pruncul, Goian, Cricova, Chisinau) and Comrat, Pobedi Street 46 for the convicts of Leova penitentiary. Also, the petitions can be sent at the following addresses: Cahul town, MD 3805, c/p 28 and Balti Municipality, MD 3112, c/p 22. There are about 10 thousand convicted persons in Moldova. The daily ration for one convict is MDL 9.6 (less than one US Dollar) and for the sick convicts – MDL 16 (about USD 1.35). The means provided by the state for food are equal to MDL 4-5 per day for one convict (about USD 0.45). Only 9.9% of the necessities of drugs were provided to the penitentiary system last year.