A/HRC/4/40/Add.4 page 17 be held in the “Escorpión”, or whether these criteria are written down in a set of rules accessible to the detainees and the outside world. There appear to be no written decisions referring detainees to “Escorpión”, no accessible information on the motives and duration of the isolation measure, no means to challenge the sanction. The juez de ejecución and public defence lawyers do not appear to ever enter the “Escorpión”, so that the detainees there are basically incommunicado. 2. The situation in the juvenile detention centres 66. Similarly, and notwithstanding the undoubted efforts recently made by those in charge of the juvenile detention centres “Renaciendo” and “El Carmen”, there are currently many juveniles deprived of their liberty without legal basis. Registers and individual files of detainees in IHNFA facilities are in a catastrophic state. They do not reflect the situation on the ground, but they are often sufficient to determine that the internee is being detained without a legal basis, either because he has served his socio-educative measure, as juvenile sentences are called, or because the preventive internment order has not been renewed, or because detention has been extended beyond the limits provided for in the law. IHNFA argues that even when an internment order has expired it cannot release an internee without a judicial order to do so, and the Working Group does not doubt that this claim is made in good faith. But this stance simply overlooks the fact that in the absence of a judicial decision justifying detention, the deprivation of liberty is without legal basis and thus arbitrary. 3. The situation in police stations 67. As stated above, the Working Group is under the impression that the police are generally taking their duty to comply with the strict and short time limits for police detention of suspects seriously. However, as with prisons and juvenile facilities, records of arrests, detentions, transfers and releases at police stations are in a deplorable state and do in fact not allow a real control of the legality of detention. In the course of the visit, the Working Group delegation repeatedly drew the attention of the police to the importance of registers showing whenever a person is taken into custody and all changes in the detainee’s status, with proof (stamp and signature) of the responsible authority, as an X-ray of detention essential for the prevention of abuses. B. Lack of effectiveness of public defenders 68. The new criminal code introducing the adversarial system significantly increases the role and the responsibility of defence counsel in the criminal trial. In a country like Honduras, in which a significant portion of the population is too poor to afford a private lawyer, the role of the public defender is absolutely central to equality of arms in the criminal process and the prevention of arbitrary detentions. In fact, according to information received by the Working Group, more than half of the criminal defendants have to rely on a public defender. In the four years since the entry into force of the new criminal procedure code, the number of public defenders has grown from 90 to approximately 250. 69. This sharp increase in the number of public defence lawyers is to be warmly welcomed. However, the resources assigned to this public service indispensable for the rule of law remain insufficient. Public defenders appear to lack fundamental office equipment, such as computers