“Fifty-five magistrates opted this weekend for a very singular excursion, observe The last news. As a test, they were locked up for two days and one night in the brand new prison of Haren in order to understand what prison life is like.” The principle of this experiment is that the magistrates, all volunteers, were subjected to the same conditions, daily program and compulsory activities as the real prisoners, from Saturday September 17 in the morning, to Sunday afternoon. “They must obey the orders of the guards and they are forbidden to use their phones.”
An emergency password has however been provided in case one of the fake prisoners wants to end the experiment sooner than expected, specifies the newspaper, which inquired about the code in question: it is is about the word “terminus”.
Prison village
According to the Minister of Justice Vincent Van Quickenborne, this experience “will undoubtedly help them when deciding whether deprivation of liberty is the best solution to punish someone who has committed a fault.”
Killing two birds with one stone is also “a good dress rehearsal for the prison staff who are due to take up duty within two weeks”. With a capacity that should eventually reach some 1,190 places, the mega-prison or “prison village of Haren” will replace three Brussels prisons, including a recent report, quoted by the chain BX1, denounced the alarming state.
Belgium is also one of the European countries with the highest rate of prison overcrowding, reported in the spring the RTBF based on a report compiling data from the Council of Europe.