A/HRC/13/39/Add.2 restaurants and the supermarket, among other benefits. The fact that most of the detainees held there are persons with a certain economic and social status clearly indicates a separation and categorization of prisoners, which leads to disparities between the rights that are being guaranteed, a clear sign of discrimination by the authorities against poor detainees. 49. The Special Rapporteur is concerned about the placement policy applied by the police. He learned that the categorization and assignment of a suspect or offender to a prison is based on a very brief evaluation, taking into account social status, origin, the gravity and number of crimes committed, as well as the general behaviour of the person. He was further told that there was an informal ranking of prisons and their respective regimes, according to which Libertad Penitentiary was considered to be the strictest regime, followed by COMCAR. If a detainee violated the prison rules in COMCAR, he would be sent to Libertad Penitentiary as punishment. 50. Furthermore, as a general practice, there is no separation whatsoever between pretrial detainees and convicted prisoners, in flagrant violation of international norms.45 Furthermore, approximately two thirds of all persons held in prison are pretrial detainees, due to considerable delays in the judicial system.46 Taking into account the rising levels of crime in Uruguay, this proportion will likely increase in the coming years. The extensive recourse to pretrial detention is contrary to the principle of the presumption of innocence47 and the deprivation of liberty as a last resort.48 51. The system of family visits was deemed fairly liberal by the Special Rapporteur. Families can visit a few times a week, and are allowed to stay for several hours. Unfortunately, this positive aspect is undermined by the fact that visitors, including women and children, are subjected to very intrusive inspections, including body cavity searches, when they visit their family members in prison, violating their human dignity. An additional complaint received from many detainees was that their families were unable to visit them, since many of them came from locations far from Montevideo, where the larger prisons are located. 52. The Special Rapporteur received a favourable impression of the establishment of prisoner’s committees (mesas) and the election of prison delegates. These delegates represent all detainees in their respective modules or units of the prisons, and serve as the primary interlocutors with the prison authorities to discuss conditions, complaints of illtreatment and lack of medical treatment, among other issues.49 However, the Special Rapporteur was concerned at reports that the delegates were not always allowed to carry out their task freely and that some obstructions were imposed. 53. The Special Rapporteur was encouraged by the Government’s recognition of the severity of the problem of the prison system and by the steps taken since 2005. In 2005, the Law 17.897 on the Humanization and Modernization of the Prison System (Law 17.897) was approved. The law established a series of measures to improve prison conditions, including, for example, by granting provisional liberties such as house arrest and parole. Nevertheless, these measures were only applicable to those persons who were not accused 45 46 47 48 49 12 Ibid., p. 12. Ibid., p. 101. Article 14 ICCPR. Article 9, para. 3, ICCPR See also Comisionado Parlamentario, Informe de Actuación y Evaluación del Sistema Penitenciario Nacional, 2008, chapter III, pp. 45 et seq. GE.09-17655