Awaiting Care: Health Risks, Human Rights Abuses and the Need to Reform Pretrial Detention
The excessive use of pretrial detention—the arrest and incarceration of people who have not yet been convicted of any crime—poses a great risk to public health and human rights, requiring urgent attention from health and prison reform advocates alike. Globally, almost 10 million people yearly spend time in detention without appearing before a judge. Pretrial detainees account for over a third of all the people in jails and prisons around the world, and are frequently held in overcrowded, substandard conditions without medical treatment, medication, or any measures for infection control
As this fact sheet outlines, the health risks associated with pretrial detention affect not only those detained but also societies at large, as people cycle out of prison and pretrial detention and back in the the community.
European Court of Human Rights Finds Russia Responsible for Death of Whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky
The European Court of Human Rights today delivered a comprehensive rebuke to Russia over the 2009 death in pretrial detention of Sergei Magnitsky, the accountant who had previously exposed a $230m tax fraud involving officials of Russia’s powerful Interior Ministry.
Volunteer Lawyers Give New Direction to Nigerian Legal Aid Initiative
In the town of Ikorodu, local lawyers are delivering free legal aid to detainees within 48 hours of arrest and joining an effort to steer people charged with nonviolent crimes away from unnecessary detention.
Nigeria’s Legal Aid Lawyers Win Police Recognition
A legal aid scheme that targets Nigeria’s excessive use of pretrial detention is primed to expand across the country.
