NCJ Number
161081
Date Published
1994
Length
17 pages
Annotation
This report assesses detention policies and conditions for juveniles in Jamaica and recommends changes.
Abstract
The report is based on the author's visits to police lockups and interviews conducted in Jamaica in June 1994. The findings show that daily in Jamaica children as young as 10 years old are locked in dark, overcrowded, filthy cells infested with rodents and insects. Sometimes they are held with adults charged with serious crimes. While in the cells, children are subjected to physical and mental abuse from police and other inmates and are often denied appropriate medical care if they are injured or ill. None of the children detained are able to go to school or are allowed outside for recreation. Most of the children are suspected of offenses, but some are in need of care because they have been abused, neglected, abandoned, or labelled "uncontrollable" by their guardians. They are in police lockups because the police do not move them to more appropriate facilities designed for children, usually because such facilities are overcrowded or far away. Some children stay in lockups for only a few days, but others remain in detention for weeks and even months. Eighteen recommendations are designed to reform policies for juvenile detention with adults, arrest and detention, length of detention, abuse in detention, and conditions in detention.