PROTECTION OF PROPERTY (OPINION) administration thus has custody and, consequently, the responsibility of the property, except when it is established that the loss, destruction or deterioration of said property are not attributable to it. With this one exception, it has the responsibility to ensure that the property is not lost, destroyed or damaged and, when it is, to compensate its owners for its value, as is currently foreseen in certain cases (see §14 below). §3 As the Ombudsman (Médiateur de la République) noted in his last annual report, property of any kind must be inventoried in the presence of and authenticated by both parties each time the property, of any kind whatsoever, is: • • turned over to the accounting department of a facility; deposited or withdrawn in an establishment's locker room. §4 The necessary personnel and time must be made available for this purpose, particularly in remand prisons, in light of the requirements that such inventories impose. Only trained prison wardens dedicated solely to this task must be able to carry out the duties in accordance with a formalised procedure and, as is already the case in certain establishments, computerised as early as possible. In their absence, especially at night, the property must be kept in a closed location in closed packages by means making it impossible to open until the inventory is taken no later than the next business day; in case of the departure of a prisoner, inventories are performed 24 hours in advance at the earliest and the packages are sealed in the same manner. Under no circumstances shall inmates assigned to general service intervene in these operations, except possibly for handling already sealed packets. §5 To facilitate the implementation of controls, the locker rooms of penitentiary facilities (at least those in which the greatest number of transfers are conducted) must be equipped with X-ray baggage screening tunnels. §6 The boxes in which the inmate's belongings are placed (except those submitted to the accounting department) are uniform and meet the requirements of the instructions issued in 2009 by the Prisons Administration Director. However, special packaging must be used to distinguish essential goods, all placed in a single priority cardboard box. These items shall be returned to the transferred prisoner upon his/her arrival at the new facility, pursuant to the previous recommendation regarding the inventory. 43