Inmates escape prison in Medan

Inmates escape prison in Medan

Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan

Scores of adult inmates, who were being kept temporarily at a
Children's Penitentiary in Medan, escaped at dawn on Friday,
raising public concern over poor security and overcrowding in
prisons. Three of them, however, were reportedly recaptured a few
hours after the escape.

The 31 inmates, who are mostly serving sentences of between
one and four years for drug offenses, escaped from the prison
after helping one another to reach the roof of a large dining
room. They then broke through the roof and scaled down the prison
walls.

A senior government official, Bambang Winahyo, admitted that
the escape happened due to the negligence of prison guards.

Five guards were on duty at dawn on Friday, but four of them
had left their posts, he said. Instead of staying in their own
posts, the four joined a friend guarding another post near the
prison's entrance, for reasons unknown, said Bambang, the head of
the correctional division at North Sumatra's justice and human
rights office.

The absence of the guards enabled the inmates to escape the
prison, moreover rain was pouring down in the prison area, making
it difficult for the guards to hear anything, said Bambang.

Bambang explained that the 31 inmates, aged between 20 and 25
years old, were among 118 adult inmates being housed in a large
dining room in the Children's Penitentiary. Besides this group,
there was also another 308 adult inmates being housed in other
halls and cells in the Children's Penitentiary.

The 426 inmates, from Labuhan Deli prison, were being
temporarily housed at the Children's Penitentiary because the
Labuhan Deli Prison was already overcrowded. Some 500 children
are also detained in the same prison.

"The 31 adult inmates had apparently observed the situation in
the prison closely as they have been there for two months," said
Bambang at the Children's Penitentiary on Jl. Tanjung Gusta in
Medan.

North Sumatra Provincial Police chief Insp. Gen. Iwan
Pandjiwinata, who visited the prison on Friday morning, said that
he had instructed his men to recapture the inmates. The order
bore fruit a few hours later after three inmates were recaptured
in Tembung and Deli Serdang area near Medan, according to
detik.com newsportal.

Hamid Awaluddin, the Minister of Justice and Human Rights, who
made a sudden unannounced visit to the prison, promised that the
case would be probed and guilty officials severely punished.

A similar incident occurred at the Batam Penitentiary in
September last year when 52 convicts escaped by sawing through
the bars of their cells. Some have been recaptured but many are
still at large. Overcrowding and lax security have been blamed
for the escape.