Who are we?
The information site on prisons throughout the world
Narratives of mass incarceration
interview
7 November 2022. Dr. Dreisinger is the founder of the Incarceration Nations Network (INN), an international community that works to support, instigate and popularize prison reform efforts around the world. Prison Insider met her in Lyon during a joint screening of the docuseries.
France: in search of freedom
Focus
7 November 2022. Kevin Dubost is a photographer and social worker who led the project “À traversé”: a series of photographs capturing the moments when people being released from prison experienced freedom.
Togo: harsh detention conditions for children
Interview
23 november 2022. What is the response to offences committed by minors? In many cases, it is detention. Civil society actors express concern over the situation of minors in conflict with the law. Three key questions shed light on this issue.
They are talking about it
Testimonials
Ivory Coast: the price of freedom
David D. was imprisoned in the Abidjan prison (MACA) for 29 months, and he is still awaiting trial. This is a testimony of an arbitrary detention, amidst uncertainty and corruption.
Lebanon: using theatre as therapy in prison
Theatre comes to Lebanese prisons. Catharsis is an organisation that offers drama therapy workshops in prisons. Its director Zeina Daccache produced documentaries about three such projects that took place in prisons.
UK: finding an outlet
Noel Smith learned to read and write while serving time in prison. Today, he is an author and editor for Inside Time, a newspaper published for prisoners that also serves as a platform for them to speak out. He shared with us his story.
Lebanon: liberty in dreams
Hussein is incarcerated at Roumieh central prison. He told Prison Insider about his daily life: a life where liberty only exists in his dreams.Recently
News
Argentina: el papa Francisco criticó “el deterioro de las condiciones de detención”
This article is not available in English.
Argentina: debate por mejorar las condiciones en cárceles y alcaidías bonaerenses
This article is not available in English. This article is available in the following versions: Spanish
Argentina: elaboración de un informe sobre las condiciones de detención en Entre Ríos
This article is not available in English. This article is available in the following versions: Spanish
Russia: Navalni denuncia un endurecimiento de las condiciones de detención
This article is not available in English. This article is available in the following versions: Spanish
Recently
You may have missed...
Rise in female incarceration
interview
25 October 2022. The new edition of the World Female Imprisonment List, published by ICPR, shows a worrying increase in the number of women and girls behind bars. What does this trend mean in terms of penal policies and prison conditions? Interview.
Brazil: voting rights are flouted
Opinion
18 october 2022. Brazil, 2022, electoral year. The law provides that prisoners in pre-trial detention are allowed to vote. There is an ongoing legal battle for the right to vote for people in pre-trial detention.
Pakistan: submerged and forgotten
interview
18 October 2022. Pakistan experienced torrential rains between June and September 2022. The floods submerged a third of the country. What about prisons? Zainab Mahboob and Fakhra Irshad from Justice Project Pakistan shared with us what they know about the current situation. Interview.
"Abolishing the death penalty is a universal fight”
Interview
6 October 2022. Human rights groups and authorities from around the world will gather in Berlin united by a common goal: to end capital punishment. What can we expect from the 8th World Congress against the Death Penalty?
Fernando Moleres
Sierra Leone
Virginie de Galzain
Madagascar
Carlos Hernandez
Venezuela
Sarah Bones
United States of America
Jérémie Jung
Latvia
Cosmin Bumbut
Romania
Stephen Tourlentes
United States of America
Augustin Le Gall
Tunisia
Fernando Moleres
Sierra Leone
Sebastien van Malleghem
Belgium
Seyi Rhodes, reporter
Haiti
Pierre Duvert
Madagascar
Irina Popova
Belarus
Nathalie Mohadjer
Burundi
Grégoire Korganow
France
Andrew Aitchison
United Kingdom
Breaking the Circle
Minors released from prison have no access to reentry programs. Some go back to the streets and try to survive; others receive support from various organisations.
Prisons of Madagascar
“Overcrowding, the stench of urine as soon as you cross the threshold, rats and vermin everywhere…” Virginie de Galzain
The Franklin Masacre survivors
Carlos Hernandez photographed the men who survived Franklin Masacre’s reign over the General Penitentiary of Venezuela.
Story of Earl Reinhardt
While seeking out a subject for a report on aging detainees, Sarah Bones meets Earl, who has spent the past 50 of his 75 years behind bars.
Pāri mūriem
Behind the walls of the juvenile detention centre of Cēsis, the prisoners are getting bored. Jérémie Jung leads photography workshops with 10 of them but is confronted with censorship by the prison administration.
Camera intimă
Conjugal visits are allowed for prisoners and take place in private rooms, located inside the prison compound. Cosmin Bumbut photographed those places, when they were empty.
Of Lengths and Measures
When nights start to fall, prisons still glow on the outskirts of towns. Stephen Tourlentes unveils the architectural stigma of incarceration.
Cinema in prison
Four Tunisian prisons host screenings at a film festival. Augustin Le Gall, a photojournalist, brings back a sample of the wind of freedom that blew into Borj Erroumi prison.
Waiting for Justice
Children are incarcerated illegally in the maximum security prison of Pademba, in Sierra Leone. Fernando Moleres shares with us the daily lives of the minors in the Prison of Freetown.
Prisons
Being deprived of freedom causes extreme distress. The images by Sebastien van Malleghem denounce the archaic and opaque walls which enclose these men and women and their broken lives.
Forgotten prisoners
Prisoners are waiting. Most of them will never be judged because their files are missing. Many will die.
Seyi Rhodes, reporter, comments on photographs he has taken inside the Port-au-Prince prison.
Captured childhood
More than one million children are imprisonned throughout the world, according to UNICEF. In Madagascar, a large majority of them are yet to be judged.
Pierre Duvert captures their everyday life.
Welcome to LTP
In Belarus, people are locked up to wean them off alcohol. These are strange places where time seems to have stopped after the fall of Soviet Union.
The Dungeon
Children languishing in dark cells. They are victims of alleged arbitrary justice, and they spend years without seeing the inside of a courtroom.
Prisons
From 2011 to 2014, Grégoire Korganow went inside some 20 corrections facilities and photographed everything he saw: inside the cells, courtyard, visitation booths, showers, solitary confinement block, and more, by day and by night.
Prison Stories
The everyday lives of inmates, guards and visitors.
