In this blog, PRI’s Vicki Prais, looks at the challenges faced by elderly people in prison, sentenced to life imprisonment. Vicki notes that the ‘greying’ of the prison population has seen an upward trend and warrants attention as it is a group that will certainly grow given the rise in life sentences handed down globally. […]
23rd August 2019
At the UN Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice in May 2018, Olivia Rope, PRI’s Policy and Programme Manager, called on the UN and its member states to address the global increase in life sentences and their implementation. In this blog, based on Olivia’s speech, Katie Reade summarises the causes of the current crisis, […]
11th June 2018
PRI has launched its annual flagship publication, Global Prison Trends 2018. Here we publish the foreword to the report, written by the Rt Hon Helen Clark, a Member of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, Former Prime Minister of New Zealand, and Former Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme. Every year, Global Prison Trends by […]
15th May 2018
On Monday this week, the US Supreme Court ruled in Montgomery v Louisiana that people currently serving life sentences for offences they committed as juveniles must either be considered for parole or re-sentenced. In 2012, the Court had held that a mandatory life sentence without parole (LWOP) was unconstitutional for those under the age of […]
3rd February 2016
On the 50th anniversary of the de facto abolition of the death penalty in the UK, PRI’s Oliver Robertson says that while the path to abolition has varied from country to country, the UK’s swift conversion of a moratorium to abolition in five years may have lessons for some states today. This week marks 50 years […]
12th November 2015
The number of older prisoners in prison populations is growing in many countries, in part due to ageing populations and often in part to punitive sentencing policies. However, older prisoners are more likely than their peers in the community to be disabled, to have multiple, costly chronic health conditions, and experience age-related cognitive impairment including […]
25th February 2015
For the second time in the past three months, PRI has been sent a book that gives a devastating insight into the dysfunctional workings of the American criminal justice system. In the first, Nancy Mullane, also a winner in our international journalism competition last year, interviews a number of prisoners and follows their attempts to […]
8th January 2015
Like many countries, Jordan has had a moratorium on executions since 1996, but death sentences continue to be handed down, with 22 imposed in 2013. This article explores the government’s position on the death penalty and why many believe it should finally be taken out of the lawbooks. It was first published on 2 April 2014 in […]
3rd November 2014
In many countries around the world, the number of older people in prison is growing fast. In the fifth expert blog in our anniversary series, Bridget Sleap, Senior Rights Policy Adviser at HelpAge International, outlines some of the challenges that older prisoners face in prisons, which – whether in terms of their lay-out, regime, healthcare […]
25th September 2014
Courts have started to consider whole life sentences without the possibility of parole to be in breach of the prohibition on inhuman and degrading punishment. But what about ordinary prison sentences? In the fourth blog in our anniversary series, Dr Mary Rogan, Head of Law at Dublin Institute of Technology and Chair of the Irish Penal […]
25th August 2014