“The inmate who is in a coma after being violently assaulted whilst on remand in Manawatu Prison, was caused because of a failure in the prison – not the fact he was being held on remand," says Darroch Ball co-leader of Sensible Sentencing Trust.

“Being held on remand for the crimes that the individual allegedly committed was the appropriate move and the court decision is not to blame for the assault that occurred at Manawatu Prison.”

“The real problem lies with the failing corrections system. If the proper processes, resources, and procedures were in place within the prison the assault wouldn’t have happened in the first place.”

“Too often there is a misguided tendency to concentrate our criticisms towards changing what we do with sentencing of offenders, in order to address the overt failures of our corrections system.”

“The fact is if our corrections system was actually correcting offenders, we wouldn’t be having this discussion.”

“Offenders need to be held to account and part of that often means being held in prison on remand. We actually too often see offenders being given bail when they should be held in custody," says Mr Ball.

“We should not fall into the trap of trying to change something in the court system because of a failure in the corrections system and expecting it to work.”

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