Details
Legal instruments & key provisions
| Legal instrument | Key provision |
|---|---|
| Law No. 354/1975 (Legge 26 luglio 1975, n. 354, Norme sull’ordinamento penitenziario e sulla esecuzione delle misure privative e limitative della libertà) | Cells must be at least 3 m2 and spacious enough, enlightened with both natural and artificial light in order to allow detainees to work and study, ventilated and heated, and provided with private, decent, and rational sanitary facilities. . Cells can have one or more beds: wherever possible, remand prisoners – i.e. those who have not yet been sentenced – and detainees serving a life-long sentence, should be given the possibility to sleep in one-bed cells (unless they ask otherwise), unless the detention facility does not allow for this accommodation. Each prisoner must be given adequate equipment for their bed. Detention facilities must be provided with specific rooms and areas to fulfil the individual necessities of the detainees, as well as of areas destined to work, training, cultural, sport, and religious activities. |
NATIONAL PREVENTIVE MECHANISM RECOMMENDATIONS
| Year | Recommendation | Report |
|---|---|---|
| 2017 | According to the NPM, the 3 m2 standard should be considered as a minimum standard – the breach of which would amount to a severe violation of human dignity – and not as the ordinary standard for jail cells. | Report details |
| 2018 | The Guarantor recommends central and local administrations to make the currently unused overnight rooms operational, suitably renovated and up to the standards required by law. Pending the execution of these works, provide for the reduction of the Institute's crowding through some targeted transfers to neighbouring Institutions, after assessing the individual positions of the detainees. Moreover, the National Guarantor recommends that detention facilities in all the Italian Regions should be progressively brought into line with the internationally defined standards on the surface area available in the overnight rooms, bearing in mind that the three square metre limit does not represent the 'ideal' space, but the threshold below which there is a strong presumption of violation of Article 3 of the ECHR, with the risk of being condemned for inhuman and degrading treatment. | Report details |
| 2024 | The trend of unabated overcrowding has been going on for a year, with a worrying progression compared to previous years: if at the end of 2022, the prison population had increased by about 2,000 compared to December 2021, the increase on 30 December 2023 is exactly double, with about 4,000 more prisoners. In the last three months (14 October 2023 to 14 January 2024), the increase was 1,196 admissions, thus, almost 400 per month. | Report details |