Table 2: Complaints received by ICCVs* of inmates ill-treatment’. These guidelines also emphasise that the use of force and restraints for detainees in police custody assaulted by prison officials in South Africa or awaiting trial should be based on the presumption Year of innocence. Number of complaints 2014/15 2 341 Abuse of electric shock equipment in South Africa 2013/14 4 203 The heads of South Africa’s correctional centres are under a 2012/13 3 370 statutory obligation to report the use of force and mechanical 2011/12 1 945 2010/11 2 276 2009/10 2 189 restraints on inmates to the Inspecting Judge for Correctional Services. A report by the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services (JICS) noted with concern the ‘general disregard by 40 many heads of centres of their responsibility in this regard’. As such, it is difficult to estimate how widely electric shock * Independent Correctional Centre Visitors Source: JICS annual reports devices are used in prisons. Warder violence in South African prisons Although instruction on the use of force is a standard part of training provided to DCS officials, each year thousands of incidents involving the assault of inmates by prison officials are recorded in South African prisons (see Table 2). A 2014 JICS newsletter referred to ‘the shocking mistreatment of inmates by DCS officials’, in terms of general use of force.41 There are reports of unlawful beatings and assault by prison guards in South African prisons, including the misuse of electric shock devices. It is not always clear how these shocks are administered, but it could entail the use of stun shields, stun belts or hand-held electronic immobilising stun devices. Each year thousands of incidents involving the assault of inmates by prison officials are recorded The South African Human Rights Commission ‘noted with concern’ a March 2014 incident at St Albans Correctional Centre in Port Elizabeth, in which a search for contraband ‘led to the alleged mass-beatings, electric shock and torture’ of 200 inmates.42 Gross human-rights violations, involving more than 100 inmates, also took place at St Albans in July 2005 (see the next section for further details). In 2013 an inmate at the Losperfontein Correctional Facility was ‘allegedly tortured (shocked) with an electric anti-riot shield’, which prompted an investigation.43 In 2009 an inmate was killed by prison officials at Pietermaritzburg Correctional Centre.44 JICS reported that ‘[o]fficials used batons, crutches and an electric-shield even when [the inmate was] mechanically restrained’. Criminal charges were brought against the perpetrators. In the same year, an inmate was killed by officials at Ebongweni Correctional Centre, Kokstad. JICS reported: ‘[The] deceased [was] brutally assaulted by officials with batons, electric shields and booted feet [who] then failed to provide adequate and timeous medical attention.’45 In 2006 the Jali Commission reported that prisoners from the C-Max prison in Kokstad testified that ‘they were assaulted for no reason, strip-searched in front of female staff, and given electrical shocks by warders using electric shock shields. The commission learned that electric shocks of prisoners in C-Max had become an unofficial but routine “initiation ceremony”.’ 46 The commission concluded that the prisoners were not treated with dignity and that their human rights had not been respected. There have been allegations of torture and assault involving the use of electric shock equipment by staff at the Mangaung Correctional Centre, a private facility run by British firm G4S. In May 2005 inmate Isaac Nelani was allegedly tortured before he died in an isolation cell.47 Two prisoners provided eyewitness accounts of Nelani being assaulted by Emergency Security Team (EST) staff, which involved Nelani being shocked by electrified anti-riot shields. The state pathologist ruled the death as suspicious. In a March 2013 incident, inmates alleged that EST warders shocked fellow prisoner Tebogo Bereng repeatedly on the head with electric anti-riot shields while he was handcuffed. He was then taken into isolation and further assaulted. Hours later he was pronounced dead. Legal cases in South Africa A number of legal cases have been launched against officials in relation to abuse of electric shock devices and other forms of ill-treatment in South African prisons. A class action lawsuit is being compiled against G4S. At least 50 inmates allege they were tortured by prison guards at the POLICY BRIEF 86 • JUNE 2016 5