Thursday, at the initiative of Government Commissioner Jean Danton Léger, the funeral of 20 inmates of the national penitentiary was celebrated at the Sainte-Anne church in Port-au-Prince, in the presence of families, relatives and friends the victims.

Prison overcrowding (over 5,000 prisoners, less than 0.5 m2 per prisoner https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-16234-haiti-social-hell-in-the-national-penitentiary.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-1112-haiti-prisons-national-penitentiary-05-m2-per-inmate.html ), the lack of hygiene, food and health care, are the main causes of these deaths, deplores Port-au-Prince Government Commissioner Jean Danton Léger who criticizes the passivity of the prison authorities and that of Jocelerme Privert which seems to ignore the country's detainees.

Father Jean Robert Louis, celebrant of funeral underlined this gesture of laudable respect of the Commissioner of the Government and reiterated the will of the Pastoral Commission of its parish, to support the Procuratorate of Port-au-Prince in this type of initiative. It should be remembered that formerly the deceased prisoners were thrown into the mass grave without very often the families is informed.

It is not the first wave of detainees that Commissioner Léger has buried. On September 22, it was the burial at the Port-au-Prince cemetery of 6 prisoners who died among other things of contagious diseases due to the insalubrity of the cells, lack of food or sleep https://www.icihaiti.com/en/news-18727-icihaiti-justice-the-national-penitentiary-of-death.html . From July to December 2016 18 prisoners died in the National Penitentiary because of poor conditions of detention.

Moreover, these deaths of detainees do not seem to end, Jean Danton Léger said that a dozen other bodies were already waiting at the morgue to be buried next week.

One can only deplore the laxity of the Government and the silence of the Human Rights Organizations, who seem more concerned with the respect of citizens' voting rights as their right to life...

SL/ HaitiLibre