VVD deputy: ‘According to the Americans, the design of the EBI is wrong’

MP Ellian (VVD) received feedback in the US on the design of the extra secure institution in Vught. A prison for serious criminals, like the EBI, should never be housed in an existing penitentiary. Because serious criminals can come into contact with others there.

by Joost van der Wegen

Visit

VVD MP Ulysse Ellian said this week during the Justice Ministry budget debate in the House of Representatives that he had visited a so-called ADX Supermax prison in the United States.

He spoke with guards there and with FBI employees. The most serious offenders are imprisoned in this American super-security institution, Ellian explained. “Terrorists, gang leaders, cartel leaders, prison gang leaders, serial killers.”

Design

Ellian showed the Americans the Dutch Extra-Secure Institution (EBI) facility in Vught, where the most serious criminals and suspects, such as Willem Holleeder and Ridouan Taghi, are locked up. A guard then indicated that he thought the configuration was wrong.

Ellian: “He said, with the whole party in agreement, that an EBI should always be a separate building with tight security on the outside, and only those who have a business in the EBI should be allowed in. According to him, one should never mix on a site with other prisons, because then there are far too many people who approach the EBI unnecessarily.

Problems

Ellian wondered whether the Intensive Surveillance Services (AIT) in Dutch prisons, which Justice Minister Dilan Yeşilgöz-Zegerius (VVD) wants to focus more on, will be enough. “The idea is good, but the reality is that criminal ringleaders or people suspected of being in the service of crime have no place here. In an AIT, an inmate is allowed to call every day. In an AIT, a group of prisoners is in contact with each other. And an AIT is in a prison. Due to some movement, such an AIT inmate must always pass through the regular prison population. Communication is controlled, but not as neatly as in an EBI. That’s asking for trouble.

Suffer

Moreover, the organization Human Rights Watch in the United States of objections to the conditions in American supermax prisons. They would lead to unnecessary suffering and humiliation of prisoners. A judge has indicated that incarceration in a supermax prison exceeds “the limits of what a person can physically and mentally bear”.