Fifty-five volunteer magistrates are being held in a prison in the Brussels region this weekend to experience the life of detainees, Belgian Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne announced on Saturday.
“Judges know what it’s like in a prison, but by experiencing them themselves, they can pronounce sentences with full knowledge of the facts”said the federal minister, quoted in the statement.
The magistrates arrived at 09:00 (08:00 in Lisbon) at Haren Prison, a new facility with a capacity of 1,190 inmates that is due to open on September 30, where they will be treated as real inmates until the end of Sunday. a spokesman for the prison administration explained to France-Presse.
“Participating magistrates – criminal judges, investigating judges, prosecutors… – have applied voluntarily. They will follow the orders and instructions of prison staff. The aim is to make incarceration as realistic as possible.”says the statement.
“They won’t be able to use cell phones, but they will have the opportunity to receive visits from relatives, just like the real inmates.
Magistrates follow the normal daily schedule of the detainees, eat the same meals and have the same mandatory activities. They will, among other things, serve the servants in the kitchen and the laundry. The lights will go out at 10 p.m.,” the ministry said.
“This immersion offers magistrates who hand out prison sentences an opportunity to experience what deprivation of liberty means,” said Rudy Van de Voorde, director-general of the prison institutions, also quoted in the statement.
Source: DN
