Research project PC/01 (Research action PC)
The current legal protection of prisoners is unsatisfactory. Prisoners' rights have not formally undergone any favourable evolution, the status of judicial rules concerning imprisonment is extremely precarious, said rules being hardly accessible, and there is no procedure specifically concerned with situations of imprisonment and through which a prisoner might assert his/her rights before a court.
Yet there are plenty of arguments in favour of adequately determining the legal status of prisoners. On one hand, general human rights treaties impose certain obligations that have implications as to the legal protection of prisoners. On the other hand, the modified pennological view of the prison penalty and the modified penitentiary reality have revealed the necessity of an adequate legal status for prisoners.
The objective of this research is to develop a model, focusing specifically on the Belgian penitentiary system, of possible measures for settling the legal status of prisoners. The model is based on a survey of specific legal needs in a prison context and on an evaluation of models concerning this legal status that exist in other countries.
