Medium-term deprivation of liberty
94. On the inspection visits made in 2011 shortcomings were found in the psychological and psychiatric assistance available to detainees during their time at
these centres. Moreover, the lack of a protocol for the prevention of suicide, as
mentioned in paragraph 266 of the Annual Report 2010, was found to persist.
This Office has therefore issued a recommendation to the GDP for the correction
of these shortcomings, taking the suicide prevention protocol in place at SGIPrun prisons as a reference point. The existence of such a protocol would help
minimise the risk of death by suicide, as occurred in the case currently under
investigation by the Migration & Equal Treatment Area of the Office of the Ombudsman of the death of a foreign national at the CIE in Barcelona in 2010, in
which the Association of appearing complained of the failure to adopt adequate
measures which, in its opinion, could have prevented this death.
A recommendation has
95. On all three inspection visits in 2011 it was again observed that there was no
written evacuation protocol in place and that there were no intercom units in the
dormitory areas to enable permanent contact to be maintained between detainees and custodial officers, as mentioned in paragraph 262 of the Annual Report
2010. This Office has issued a recommendation that both these shortcomings be
corrected.
A recommendation has
96. For security reasons, the dormitories at most CIEs do not have toilets and are
kept locked at night. On the inspection visit to the CIEs in Las Palmas de Gran
Canaria and Valencia it was reported that the women’s dormitory module was left
unlocked so that they had free access to the toilet facilities, but that this was not
the case in the men’s module. Complaints were received during the inspection
visit to the CIE in Valencia concerning an officer who habitually ignored requests
from detainees for dormitory doors to be opened so that they could go to the toilet
during the night, which meant that they had to use empty water bottles to relieve
themselves at night. On the day of the inspection visit to the CIE in Santa Cruz de
Tenerife there were only six detainees and, as an exception, the dormitory doors
were left unlocked all night so that detainees were free to go to the bathroom.
These two individual cases notwithstanding, the Ombudsman has issued a recommendation to the DGP for detainees to be guaranteed access to their dormitories and bathrooms at all times, as per the criterion laid down in paragraph 268 of
the Annual Report 2010. It must be pointed out that magistrate’s courts no 6, 19
and 20 in Madrid, in their role as monitors of the CIE in the city passed resolution
12/2010 on November 25, 2011, in which they required the head of the said CIE to
guarantee that detainees who needed to relieve themselves during the night when
the dormitories were locked could access toilets within no more than three minutes of their requesting to do so. The DGP reports that renovation work is being
carried out at the said CIE to install toilets in the dormitories.
A recommendation has
97. All three centres inspected were found to be operating at below their maximum capacity – e.g. 125 people were confined at the CIE in Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the course of 2011 – but this Office is aware that other CIEs were practi-
A recommendation has
THE OMBUDSMAN OF SPAIN
been made to the DGP for
the preparation of a suicide
prevention protocol.
been issued concerning the
need for a written
evacuation protocol.
been issued to the DGP for
detainees to be guaranteed
access to dormitories and
bathrooms at all times.
been issued to the DGP for
detainees to be allowed to
117
Select target paragraph3
Connect to a paragraph
Connect to an entity
Disable highlights
Add to table of contents