The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

NATIONAL Security Minister Marvin Dames expects to announce the new commissioner of the Bahamas Department of Correctional Services this month.

“We already know who it is,” he told reporters yesterday. “We just have to go through and finish up one or two administrative stuff and that should be announced very shortly.”

The government has searched locally and internationally for its new correctional commissioner. The person will succeed Patrick Wright who is on pre-retirement leave.

The new commissioner is expected to help the prison focus on correctional, rather than penal services.

Mr Dames could not say when a central plank of this transition, the introduction of a parole system, will officially begin.

The introduction of a parole system began under the Christie administration, but it is not clear when the proposed Probation Bill will be tabled in Parliament.

“There is a lot of work to do,” Mr Dames said. “Oftentimes people don’t see it but there is a lot of work that has to take place in the background. We could bring a bill, we could enact it as was the practice of the past, and then there may be nothing to support it. During the last year we had a conclave to actually review the bill with all the stakeholders to determine what it is we need to do to make sure we’re moving in the right direction on that.”

The Ministry of National Security recently signed a memorandum of understanding with Correctional Services Canada.

“Training for parole and programme officers began in the fall of 2018,” Mr Dames said at an event formally announcing the partnership. “The Inter-American Development Bank through its Citizen Security and Justice Programme conducted a training seminar for representatives of all branches of law enforcement stakeholders. During the seminar, the parole legislation as expressed in the 2016 Conditional Release of Offenders Bill was analysed and recommendations for adjustment were made.”

The $20 million Inter-American Development Bank’s Citizen Security and Justice Programme is helping to fund the proposed system.

Under the Christie administration, a Parole and Re-entry Steering Committee made recommendations that were approved by the Cabinet of the time but not disclosed to the public.