A study confirms that prison is a lifelong social and labor sentence for most former inmates.
As noted by the Ministry of the Interior, 16,107 people over 18 years of age were behind bars last December, and another 8,874 were serving alternative measures to prison. With these numbers, Uruguay has one of the highest prison population rates on the planet.
The most widespread crime is drug trafficking, and most of the convicted “carry a criminal record that limits their job opportunities,” based on a study by the consulting firm Equipos, which shows that Uruguayan prisons do not reintegrate, since nearly 70 percent of inmates re-offend less than three years after their release.
“Prisons increase crime because many people learn more about how to commit crimes there, they come out more resentful of how badly they have been treated, without opportunities, with the impact on their family, their neighborhood,” said sociologist Emilio Rojido.
Only 24 percent of workers in Uruguay say that “you can trust” people with recent records in the penitentiary system. Twenty-seven percent consider former prisoners “to be good colleagues.” Only a third describe them as “hard workers,” while nearly half recognize that “clients do not like workers” who have been in prison at some point, El Observador reported.
The sample reveals that ex-convicts have a much more negative evaluation than other discriminated minorities such as people with disabilities or immigrants.
That is why the Ministry of the Interior appeals in the White Paper on Penitentiary Reform to “citizen awareness”, without which a profound change in the penitentiary system is not feasible.
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