After an inspiring meeting in Prague last October (more about it here), the Italian and Czech teams worked intensively on the preparation and administration of three different questionnaires addressed to specific target groups: convicts, family members of convicts and professionals. This fieldwork is essential to better understand the dynamics and challenges that these families face on a daily basis.
KEY FINDINGS AND IMPLICATIONS
Convicts (target group A):
Inmates express difficulty maintaining stable family contacts, highlighting the lack of adequate systemic support and the variability of contact options depending on the facility.
Prisoners' families (focus group B):
Families face significant barriers to communication, financial difficulties, and social stigma. the need for more frequent and supportive contact and suggestions for a less punitive and more welcoming environment for visits and ad hoc programs emerged as a central theme.
Experts (target group C):
Experts draw attention to the inflexibility and lack of programmes/resources in detention centres, and in particular to the precarious and opaque management conditions in centres for the return of persons (CPRs), and suggest significant improvements in policies and procedures to effectively support detainees and their families.
TOWARDS A GOOD PRACTICE GUIDE
Based on this information, we are developing a handbook in collaboration with Dr. Maria Carbone that will include the needs, experiences and best practices gathered. This tool will serve as a guide to improve the support of prisoners' family ties in order to facilitate effective and humane reintegration into society.
THANKS TO CONTRIBUTORS
Before we continue, we would like to take this opportunity to express our sincere thanks to all those who participated in completing the questionnaires. Your commitment and openness in sharing these personal experiences is the cornerstone of our Erasmus+ project. Thanks to every single participant, we are building an authentic knowledge base that will inform and improve policies and practices to support prisoners' families.
MOMENTS OF COMMUNITY AND CONNECTION
On 18 April, the association joined the community in Piazza del Risorgimento in Benevento for a crucial event that launched an urgent call to address the problem of suicide in prisons. This day of reflection and awareness highlighted our commitment to defend the rights and well-being of persons deprived of their liberty and their families, and reinforced the message that only through timely and humane intervention can we hope to bring about positive change.
The following day, 19 April, two members of our team met with the director of the "In Galera" restaurant in Bollate prison. This meeting laid the foundation for a constructive discussion between different actors who share a common goal: the support and social reintegration of prisoners and their families. Initiatives such as the "In Galera" restaurant, which offer prisoners work and educational opportunities, show how creativity and solidarity can help transform the prison system in a more humane and constructive direction.
Newsletter download:
The event took place within the framework of the project "Together for Greater Support of Families of Convicts" reg. no. 2022-2-CZ01-KA210-ADU-000101184, co-financed by the European Union under the ERASMUS+ programme.
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