Inmates still held at RCMP lockup as Labrador prison full

A Labrador prison described in a critical 2008 report as overcrowded and in need of structural changes continues to house the same maximum number of inmates, with overflow prisoners regularly being held at the local RCMP lockup.

Six years ago, the Tory government pledged to take action on the situation in Labrador.

But CBC Investigates has found that many of the same issues identified in that 2008 report, titled Decades of Darkness, remain problems today.

As of Oct. 4, the Labrador Correctional Centre was at its capacity of 53 prisoners, with two dozen others being held at the RCMP detachment lockup in Happy Valley-Goose Bay.

"We're always looking at new and innovative ways to respond to these needs as they arise,"Justice and Public Safety Minister Judy Manning told CBC Investigates.

"At the current time we are at capacity, as I've mentioned. We have some capacity with the RCMP holding cells and we are looking at alternative measures to alleviate any strain that may be existing at the correctional facility at this time."

Those alternative measures include transferring prisoners to other jails, giving some of them temporary absences, and even trying to move federal inmates back to federal institutions.

This is a spike in numbers and you can't take a knee-jerk reaction to a spike in numbers.- superintendent of prisonsGrahamRogerson

Graham Rogerson, Newfoundland and Labradors superintendent of prisons, says the facility is not always full.

"The numbers of people that are incarcerated are always cyclical, Rogerson said.

"Any kind of number or analysis that you do, if you looked at the Labrador Correctional Centre earlier in the year, its count would have been 35 to just over 40. Today, it's higher obviously. So it's very difficult to always say that an institution is over-full or not. I would stress at the present time it's not overcrowded. It's at its capacity."

But is it viable in the long term to use the RCMP lockup as an overflow for the Labrador Correctional Centre?

"This is a spike in numbers and you can't take a knee-jerk reaction to a spike in numbers," Rogerson said.

Decades of Darkness findings

The 2008 Decades of Darkness report concluded that "double bunking and overcrowding are serious issues"at the Labrador Correctional Centre: "This facility was not designed for the high numbers of inmates and a maximum capacity has been established at 53 inmates in order to comply with the fire marshals direction."

The Labrador Correctional Centre was built in 1984 to accommodate 38 inmates, the report notes, and "requires some structural changes to rectify deficiencies."

Months after that report was released, then-justice minister Tom Marshall acknowledged that the government was aware of the problems in Labrador.

"I can't tell you what we're going to do, but I can tell you it's a priority for the department, and we're working on it," Marshall toldSt. Johns daily newspaper The Telegram in January 2009.

There have since been no physical changes to the size of the facility, correctional officials acknowledge, although bunks were added to some cells to allow for double occupancy. Before that happened, some inmates slept on mattresses on the floor.

And sending overflow prisoners to the local RCMP lockup is nothing new, according to the Decades of Darkness report.

When the report's authors visited the Labrador Correctional Centre in 2008, there were 10 inmates being housed at the lockup because the prison was at capacity.

Earlier this month, there were 24 being held at the lockup, including remand inmates, sentenced inmates and intermittents. Rogerson says those numbers drop after the weekend, when those serving intermittent sentences are released.

Once this summer, the RCMP even moved some prisoners to the lockup in Sheshatshiu, more than 40 kilometres away.

"If LCC is full, then we at times will take prisoners until such time [as] space frees up in the LCC,"RCMP Insp. Pat Cahill said.

Were just a temporary measure until space is freed up.- RCMP Insp. Pat Cahill

"We have that capability within. That is not our mandate or our purpose we are not designed for that but we are a very safe and secure operation within ourselves."

Cahill says the Goose Bay lockup can "very comfortably hold more than 30 prisoners, although it doesnt have the same amenities as a correctional facility.

"Were just a temporary measure until space is freed up, he said.

Prison dynamic affected

Cindy Murphy, executive director at the John Howard Society of Newfoundland and Labrador, says such situations can affect the prison dynamic.

"Crowding in any prison environment is never a good thing, Murphy said. "It creates additional stress and frustration for both the staff and the inmates

"There's just no personal space whatsoever. It's really, I'd go as far to say an infringement on a person's human dignity."

The union that represents prison guards in this province says operating at maximum capacity makes life more difficult for staff.

"Your ability to carry out programs may not be as available or conducive to having so many people, obviously," Newfoundland and Labrador Association of Public and Private Employees president Carol Furlong said.

"But the correctional officers try their best to try and ensure that programs are carried out, and that there is a calm, if I can put it that way, in the facility.

Prisoners transferred last week

Department of Justice and Public Safety officials say that eight inmates were in the process of being transferred from the Labrador Correctional Centre to other provincial facilities last week.

Provincial officials were also working with their federal counterparts to transfer some federal inmates, although that process had yet to be finalized.

The department is also working to beef up staffing levels at the facility, launching an initiative to train new workers in conjunction with the College of the North Atlantic.

The superintendent of prisons acknowledges that this is one of the "highest spikes"in numbers he has seen, but action is underway to deal with the issue.

"As the minister has saidwe are moving as quickly as we can, in conjunction with other institutions, with the police force, as to how fast we can make beds available to try and reduce the stress that's on the lockup there,"Rogerson said.