"On March 18, the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella, receiving the Penitentiary Police, said: 'Urgent interventions are needed regarding suicides in prison'. There is no longer time to enumerate the cases of suicide that we are forced to update the chilling list. An unbearable drip, like the feeling of inadequacy of prevention activities. It is more necessary than ever to analyze the phenomenon of overcrowding, reiterating, once again, the urgent need for urgent interventions". This is the appeal launched by the territorial guarantors of people deprived of personal liberty to Parliament and the Minister of Justice.
The guarantors explain that "the majority of prisoners live for over 20 hours a day in overcrowded cells, from which they only leave during 'free air'. This is a violation of the principles of the Constitutional Charter and of the penitentiary regulations. This situation is not insurmountable. It is necessary to fill the time of detention with meaning, offering more cultural, work, sporting and recreational activities. Family and volunteer relationships must also be strengthened by more interviews, telephone calls, video calls. Specialized personnel are needed (psychologists , educators, psychiatrists, pedagogists, social workers, linguistic mediators) who listens to prisoners and is able to grasp the reasons for intolerable suffering".
An emphasis is placed on the need for "a greater number of alternative measures to detention. In fact, there are several thousand prisoners with a final sentence of less than or equal to three years of imprisonment. We therefore ask all Parliamentarians for specific and urgent rules, and to the Minister of Justice concrete measures quickly, in accordance with the words of the President of the Republic. We urge parliamentarians (national and European), regional and municipal councilors and supervisory magistrates to visit prisons with greater continuity and frequency, because, even today - as Piero Calamandrei wrote - 'suicides are the product of the distance of politics and civil society from prison'.
In 32 years 1,754 suicides in prison, in 2024 there will already be 31
An appointment in front of Italian prisons tomorrow to launch an appeal against suicides in cells. The Italian territorial guarantors of people deprived of personal liberty will chant aloud the names of the 31 suicides that occurred in 2024 and of the deaths from other causes, such as illness, overdose, homicide and causes to be ascertained, as well as the names of the penitentiary officers who have taken the life. The initiative was announced today by Stefano Anastasìa, guarantor of people subjected to measures restricting personal freedom in Lazio and Valentina Calderone, guarantor of Rome in front of the Regina Coeli prison in Rome.
"In 32 years, 1,754 inmates have died by suicide - explains Valentina Calderone - In the same years 2,912 have died due to illness, overdose, homicide, causes to be ascertained. The total is an impressive number, we are talking about 4,686 people in prison who died". "We are starting an awareness campaign that will continue until there are answers - explains Anastasìa - We cannot afford to have these levels of overcrowding in the summer. Here in Regina Coeli, for example, there are 1,151 prisoners for 628 places, double that. In Italy, compared to 48,000 places in prisons, there are 61,000 prisoners". All Italian guarantors have joined the appeal which will be launched tomorrow.