Trial Campaign: 53 inmates acquitted in Manica

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Trial Campaign: 53 inmates acquitted in Manica

12:15 CAT | 07 Jul 2017

Notícias

Fifty three of the 153 prisoners covered by the trial campaign at Manica Regional Penitentiary, commonly known as “Cabeça do Velho”, have been acquitted.

Manica Provincial Judicial Court spokesman Rogério de Melo told a press conference yesterday that the process, in which 200 prisoners were expected to be tried, had handed out 100 sentences ranging from a maximum of eight years prison to community service for lesser offences.

Rogério de Melo said that of those sentenced, 88 were male and 12 female, and of those acquitted 46 were male and seven female. Eight of the proceedings have not ended because of lack of evidence but would be concluded in the next few days.

De Melo reported that the process had reached 77 percent of its target, judging 153 of the 200 matters predicted. Procedural steps were being taken in the remaining 23 percent to establish the material truth.

De Melo evaluated the process positively and said that the strategy had achieved its objectives of reducing pending cases and mitigating overcrowding at the penitentiary.

Trial campaigns are the result of a memorandum signed recently between the Ministry of Justice and the Supreme Court with the aim of improving procedural speed, reducing delays in proceedings without plausible motives, and reducing overcrowding in the country’s jails.

The trial campaign will resume next year in itinerant form through mobile teams including judges, prosecutors, public defenders, bailiffs and penitentiary staff and the police and lawyers, De Melo said.

A team consisting of four justices, eight elected judges, four prosecutors and eight bailiffs worked from 12 to 23 June at the central region’s largest prison to move forward the trial of eligible defendants.

Source: Notícias