7 OTHER ISSUES 7 Other issues This section presents some specific issues that are specific to one of the agencies investigated. The issues addressed are: 1. Convitcted persons presenting themselves at prison and other new admissions 2. Access to healthcare in prisons and remand prisons 3. The actions of prison and remand prison staff 4. A former detainee who died of Covid-19 7.1 Convicted persons presenting themselves at prison and other new prison admissions Anyone given a prison sentence has the right to start serving the sentence upon request if the sentence has attained legal force. If the person convicted is not deprived of their liberty when the sentence becomes enforceable, they must be ordered without delay to present themselves at the prison where the sentence is to be served no later than a certain date.1 Despite a convicted person having the right to begin serving a prison sentence, the Prison and Probation Service may still refuse to admit them into a remand prison or prison in the event of a riot, illness or other similar extraordinary circumstances.2 In order to prevent the spread of Covid-19, the Prison and Probation Service introduced certain restrictions in the spring of 2020 regarding new admissions to prisons of convicted people who were not in custody. In a first version of Annex 7 to the Prisons and Probation Ser1 2 Sections 5 and 6 of the Length of Sentence Act (2018:25). Section 3 of the Length of Sentence Ordinance (2019:95). vice’s handbook, the agency postponed all obligations for persons to present themselves at remand prisons or prisons. This was changed on 17 March 2020, and the new version of the routine stated that obligations to present themselves at remand prisons and prisons would be postponed by two weeks at a time if the person showed symptoms of the virus. Parliamentary Ombudsman Katarina Påhlsson noted that the Prison and Probation Service had not made full use of the opportunity provided by the Length of Sentence Ordinance regarding the possibility of postponing enforcement of the serving of sentences. Furthermore, she stated that the risk of being infected with Covid-19 had been assessed as very high and continued:3 “It is a disease which poses a danger to the general public and society as a whole, and infected people can show slight or atypical symptoms. It has emerged that the health check carried out upon new admissions can be very limited and sometimes not even performed by trained healthcare staff. These are circumstances that the Prison and Probation Service must, in my opinion, consider when applying section 3 of the Length of Senctence Ordinance.” In the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s investigation, details emerged that prisons managed new inmates differently. In one of the Prison and Probation Service’s prisons, new inmates were placed separately from other inmates for a certain period of time. Meanwhile, in two other 3 See the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s decision of 30 June 2020, ref. no. O 122020. – 54 –