Community service may replace some jail time
At a ceremony held this morning in Belize City, Minister of Human Development Dolores Balderamos Garcia appointed a dozen members of the newly created National Committee on Community Service. Jacqueline Woods reports that the volunteers will form part of a multi-faceted programme to reduce crime…and the root causes of crime.
Jacqueline Woods, Reporting
The twelve commissioners will assist the Community Rehabilitation Department in formulating programmes to rehabilitate first time offenders. The objective of the programme is to get juvenile inmates, who have been incarcerated for minor offenses, out of prison and working on a number of community services.
Fermin Olivera, Director, Community Rehabilitation Dept.
“Well our prison is really filled with offenders that have committed petty crimes of a non-violent nature. It’s a costly programme and there is no true value in terms of rehabilitating these people. We believe that we can work with this population outside in the community much more effectively than any prison system can.”
The community service programme has been in place for over a decade, but due to inadequate resources, it was never used as an alternative to incarceration.
Fermin Olivera
“It was never utilized because we have been building our capacity here in Belize City and throughout the country to be able to absorb the case load that will come in. The courts will be using these provisions on an incremental basis so as not to overwhelm the department. But we are hopeful that we will have the desired impact that we are hoping we will have.”
Jacqueline Woods
“Those first time offenders who have already been incarcerated, will that mean now that they’ll be moving out of the prison system and will be engaged in this community service programme?”
Fermin Olivera
“There’s a good possibility that will happen. Certainly, we’re looking at working along with the people in the prisons and taking out the people that can come out to do some meaningful work in the areas of their personal rehabilitation as well.”
The programme will not only target first time offenders, but also deadbeat dads. Those errant fathers, instead of spending time in jail for non-payment of child support, may now have the opportunity to do some form of community service. Reporting for News 5, Jacqueline Woods.
Presently there are nine hundred and sixty-nine inmates at the Hattieville Prison: nine hundred and forty men and twenty-nine women. Of that number, seventy-five young men are in boot camp and six men are behind bars for failure to pay child support. The twelve commissioners include Sir George Brown, Rudolph Conorquie, Sharon Frazer, Major Errol Gentle, Armando Leiva, Herbert Lord, Lorna McDougal, Margaret Nicholas, Fermin Olivera, Norman Pennill, Dr. Shirlene Smith and Superintendent Edwardo Wade.
