BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - JUST two days after a resident of Her Majesty’s Prison was treated at the JNF General Hospital for injuries sustained during an altercation within the correctional facility, another one has also been treated for stab wounds.
Reports reaching this publication stated that on Wednesday (Sept. 27), a male resident had sustained stab wounds to his back during a gang-related incident in the prison and had to be taken for treatment at the hospital.
When contacted this morning, the Superintendent of Prisons, Junie ‘Scrape’ Hode confirmed that an inmate was indeed injured but categorically stated, “We had some altercations in the institution and right now investigations are going on, so I don’t want to say too much on it until the investigations are completed.”
On Monday (Sept. 25), an inmate had reportedly suffered multiple stab wounds to his head, and this was also confirmed by Hodge.
This media house was reliably informed that, like the second one, this incident was also gang related.
Hodge was also contacted for a comment on that incident but he did not offer much details, noting that prison officials were conducting an investigation into the matter.
Questioned on the recent closure of the facility to visitors, Hodge said: “We had an incident at the institution, so we have put a halt on visitation for a while.”
He further explained to this media house that it was closed prior to the first incident to facilitate the installation of the long-awaited full-body scanner.
The scanner was scheduled to be installed since 2016 after a large quantity of contraband items were discovered in the prison.
Among those items were cell phones, lighters, marijuana, improvised weapons and alcohol.
Over the years, many contraband items were sneaked into the prison and it is believed in some quarters that some untrustworthy law enforcement personnel were in collusion with the inmates.
So far, one male visitor to the institution was caught smuggling illicit items into the prison during visits, and a male member of the Royal St. Christopher and Nevis Police Force was charged in September 2016 for allegedly throwing over the prison wall what was believed to be a quantify of marijuana.
Since his appointment as Superintendent of Prisons, Hodge had recommended a number of changes to the prison’s security system, including the screening procedure, so as to eliminate the inflow of illicit items; thus the full-body scanner.
