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XI. SPECIAL CATEGORIES OF PRISONERS

WOMEN

As in most countries, women form a small proportion of the prison population in South Africa. On December 31, 1992, there were 3,369 female prisoners (790 of them unsentenced), accounting for 3 percent of the general prison population.¹¹² As a consequence, women are not subject to the same conditions of overcrowding as male prisoners.

In the Durban Westville and Pollsmoor prisons, which formerly held black prisoners, female inmates were housed in communal cells similar to those for men, though in substantially less crowded conditions. Some women were held in much smaller cells holding four or six inmates each, and some lived in single cells. In Kroonstad women's prison, which formerly held only white prisoners, almost all women C black and white C were kept in single cells, decorated by their occupants, whose individual doors were never locked. As is common in prisons worldwide, the atmosphere in women's prisons generally was much less harsh than in those housing men.

The flip side of this situation is that there are fewer institutions holding women (in recent years, the number of institutions or sections of prisons holding women has been reduced to accommodate the faster-growing male population) and consequently, women tend to be held in prisons further away from their homes than men. They have fewer visits as a result.

Another visits-related problem particularly serious for women with young children is the fact that only prisoners with group A classification are entitled to contact visits. As explained in the chapter on the "privilege" system, it takes approximately a year to reach group A from the moment of entering the prison, regardless of the crime committed, the sentence imposed and the security assessment. This means that thousands of children of female prisoners are denied the right to

have any physical contact with their mothers.¹¹³ In fact, relatively few women ever reach group A, because their sentences tend to be shorter and they simply do not stay in prison long enough to go from the entry C level all the way to A. For example, out of the 495 women in the Durban prison on the day of our visit, eighty-five were classified in group A. In Pretoria, of the eighty-seven female inmates, only two were group A prisoners. In Pollsmoor, of the 340 female inmates on the day of our visit, only twenty-six had group A classification. Only women who commit more serious crimes stand a chance of eventually being able to have contact visits of any sort. This practice, in addition to affecting the inmates, victimizes the children, who suffer from lack of physical contact with their mothers.

The South African prison system allows women with children of up to two years of age, and in some cases up to four years, to keep the children with them in prison. As of May 1993, there were 189 children under four years of age in the prisons.¹¹⁴ In prisons we visited, there were limited special arrangements for mothers and children. Cribs were located in regular cells, next to the mothers' beds, so that mother and child could be together at night. If the mothers were required to work, their babies were cared for during the mothers' work hours in moderately well-appointed nurseries by assigned prisoners. Babies born in prison do not have that fact noted on their birth registration document.

Women are at a disadvantage compared with their male counterparts in prisons in several other areas. Where there is work, they are usually required to perform what one prison official accompanying our representatives described as "typically women's work," such as laundry or sewing. There is hardly any vocational training for women. According to government statistics, as of June 30, 1991, out of 2,581 prisoners receiving vocational training nationwide, only nine were female. They were training as hairdressers. In one prison complex, in Durban, the female prison was the only institution without phones for inmates' use.

JUVENILES

Age Number of prisoners

7-13 18

14 50

15 122

16 377

17 879

18 3,614

19 4,227

20 4,903

21 2,269

Total 16,459

One of the striking features in South African prisons is the presence of very young prisoners. During our visit to the Pollsmoor Maximum Security prison, we saw inmates as young as ten years of age. At the time of our visit, Sections E1 and E2 of that prison held over 200 juvenile prisoners each: one section held those already sentenced; the other, children awaiting trial.

The chart above, based on official statistics, shows the numbers of juveniles of different age groups (sentenced and unsentenced) held in prisons as of December 31, 1992.¹¹⁵ South African prison law classifies as juveniles persons under twenty-one years of age. These figures do not include juveniles held in police lockups.

Of the total, 5,208 were awaiting trial, of whom 720 were under eighteen years of age. Of all the juveniles being held in prison, 1,446 were under eighteen; in November 1992, this figure had been 2,656.¹¹⁶

Under the Child Care Act of 1973, unconvicted children who are awaiting trial are supposed to be held in a designated "place of safety." They are not to be held in police cells unless their detention is "necessary" and "no suitable place of safety ... is available."¹¹⁷ However, there are insufficient "places of safety" available to hold all the children in custody awaiting trial. In addition, police make inadequate efforts to trace children's parents or guardians in order to release the children into their parents' care. Many hundreds of children are therefore held in police cells unnecessarily, often for periods of weeks at a time.¹¹⁸ In May 1992, the Minister of Law and Order stated to Parliament that 595 children under eighteen were being held awaiting trial in police cells on December 31, 1991. Statistics are not kept noting the numbers of children held in police cells who are not ultimately charged.

Since the recent reforms took place, juveniles kept in prison or in police cells are usually, though not always, housed separately from adults. In some prisons we visited, for example in Kroonstad, this segregation had taken place only very recently, at the end of 1992. Moreover, despite residential segregation, children often mix with adults in exercise yards, as we saw in Modderbee and Kroonstad prisons; in addition, they may be transported to court with adult prisoners, as, for example, to and from Pollsmoor prison. In Pretoria Central prison, in Transkei and in some police lockups, we witnessed juvenile prisoners being housed with adults. All this raises serious security concerns. In addition, because anybody under twenty-one years of age is classified as a juvenile, sometimes very young and vulnerable children may be housed with individuals ten years older and potentially dangerous. In some cases, but not all, there is an effort to group children by age while holding them in custody. As is the case for adults, children awaiting trial are not segregated according to the type of offense with which they are charged, so that alleged murderers may be held in the same cells as shoplifters.

The mixing of children with adults, or with children of different age groups, is particularly serious in light of the disturbingly routine allegations of sexual abuse of juvenile prisoners.

Juvenile prisoners, like adults, are no longer officially segregated by race and should receive the same treatment whether white or black. However, the criminal justice system in general treats white children much more favorably than black, and very few white juveniles are sentenced to prison terms. The only white children we saw during our visits to South African prisons were white infants held with their mothers at women's prisons. Even more than white adults, white juveniles continue to receive preferential treatment.

In many prisons, the facilities for children are extremely poor, especially where there are only a few juveniles present. In Kroonstad, for example, no formal provision was made for the handful of children being held there to have any schooling. Some prisons, in particular Leeuwkop and Rustenberg, which we did not visit, reportedly have much more elaborate programs for children, including schooling and sports facilities. In a parallel situation to the women prisoners separated from their children, juveniles in custody, especially when they are held in these centralized facilities, may be held many miles from their places of residence, and effectively cut off from their families.

Children are among the victims of violence in police cells or prisons. Children are subject to the same disciplinary measures as adults, both authorized and unauthorized. In Modderbee prison in particular, juvenile prisoners stated to us that they were frequently assaulted and that they feared to talk to our representatives, even out of earshot of the warders, in case of reprisals. In a particularly shocking example, in October 1992, thirteen-year-old Neville Snyman was raped and killed by other juvenile offenders while being held awaiting trial in Robertson prison near Cape Town. He had spent two weeks in detention before appearing in court, when he was not released because his parents had not been able to attend court on the day of the hearing.¹¹⁹

The Department of Correctional Services has indicated that it does not wish to see children in prison. Yet the lack of an integrated approach to the criminal justice system means that prisons themselves have no control over the number of children sent to them. Measures proposed by the prison service to address concerns about juvenile offenders therefore focus on improved facilities rather than keeping children out of the system from the beginning.

SECURITY PRISONERS

Detention for interrogation or for preventive purposes is authorized under the Internal Security Act of 1982 and under equivalent legislation in the nominally independent homelands.¹²⁰ In addition, under the Public Safety Act of 1953, the state president may declare an emergency and promulgate emergency regulations allowing detention in other circumstances. During the emergency that was in force between 1985 and 1990, tens of thousands of South Africans were detained without trial.¹²¹ Mass long-term detention of this type has ceased, although emergency-type laws still apply in "unrest areas" declared by the government in many black townships.¹²²

Extensive amendments to the Internal Security Act adopted in 1991 significantly improved the legal situation of security detainees, historically subject to extreme levels of abuse, and in most respects they became theoretically subject to the same treatment as unconvicted prisoners. In particular, the right of access to legal advice was restored. Detainees under the Internal Security Act or Unrest Regulations are generally held in police cells rather than prisons; they are therefore exposed to the same dangers of police brutality as others in police cells.

Until 1990, the Internal Security Act criminalized much extraparliamentary opposition activity, as well as membership of organizations such as the ANC or the South African Communist Party. Nelson Mandela was only the most famous of many black leaders held under this legislation. Security prisoners such as Mandela were generally segregated from other, purely criminal, offenders in high-security institutions such as Robben Island. Representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross were permitted to visit security prisoners from 1964, but ceased doing so in 1989, when South Africa refused to give access to detainees held under emergency legislation.

After February 1990, when the ANC and other groups were unbanned and negotiations for a transition to majority rule began, it was agreed between the government and the ANC, in two "minutes" signed during 1990 at Groote Schuur and Pretoria, that prisoners held under this legislation should be released (see also the introduction to this report). By late 1993, approximately 1,600 prisoners had been released under these procedures. The Human Rights Commission stated at the end of October 1993 that it believed that forty-six prisoners were still in custody who conformed to the description of political prisoner under the minutes. These prisoners are not segregated from other prisoners in any way, and are subject to the same conditions as prisoners convicted of criminal offenses with no political content.

JUDGMENT DEBTORS

South Africa is unusual in providing for the incarceration of judgment debtors; that is, persons against whom there is an outstanding judgment in a civil proceeding.¹²³ According to prison legislation, judgment debtors are supposed to be segregated from other prisoners; however, if this is not possible because of the small number of prisoners of the same category, judgment debtors may be housed with other unsentenced prisoners.¹²⁴ This was the case in those prisons visited by Human Rights Watch. In other respects, the conditions of their detention are similar to those for awaiting trial prisoners.