Report on the Performance of Activities of the National Preventive Mechanism for 2015 Filing of complaints and judicial protection “I recommend that the Ombudswoman (...) initiate an investigative procedure, in particular due to the fact that the same violation is recurrent: rather than being an isolated incident, it has become a practice among officials also toward other prisoners who have lost the faith in justice and the rule-of-law state, which is why they do not see the purpose in addressing anyone, not even the Ombudswoman, considering the fact that there is no penalizing of those responsible and that each complaint of the officials’ illegal actions results in retribution, further withholding of rights, threatening and bullying by the officials against whom such complaints were filed as well as by their colleagues, who believe themselves to be untouchable and above the law.” Even though the number of complaints filed to heads of penal institutions, according to records of the COPSD, increased from 378 to 577 compared to the previous year, the prisoners’ trust in this legal remedy is still insufficient. Almost 80% of the complaints were filed in only three penal institutions: Lepoglava and Glina State Prisons and Zagreb County Prison, and there are also penal institutions where no complaints were filed in the previous year, for example Rijeka, Pula and Dubrovnik County Prisons. The trust of prisoners on remand in the efficiency of complaints is reflected in the fact that there were only 23 cases when they exercised this legal remedy in 2015. Prisoners do not exercise legal remedies because they do not wish to make the officials angry and because they fear negative consequences, for example being given lower prisoner performance evaluation, not being granted any benefits or losing work engagement. Although most of the complaints filed due to inefficiency of legal remedies pertained to failure to act on complaints within the legally prescribed time limit, the prisoners’ claims that legal remedies are not used because they do not wish to make the officials angry and because they fear negative consequences, for example being given lower prisoner performance evaluation, not being granted any benefits or losing work engagement, are worrying. Prisoners have also contacted us due to long duration of executing judges’ procedures, and there was even one investigative procedure where we found that the prisoner filed a complaint against the decision on pronounced disciplinary measure and the judge issued the decision after four months, instead of issuing it within the legal deadline of 48 hours. Actions in this case were not only contrary to the provisions of the Execution of Prison Sentence Act (hereinafter: EPSA), but it is also contrary to Art. 18 of the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia, which implies achievement of efficient judicial protection via an appeal. Consequently, this issue needs to be specifically addressed at the annual meeting of executing judges. 4