South African Press Association Johannesburg

Deathrow Prisoners Still Awaiting Sentence Substitution

October 10, 2002

Pietermaritzburg

Of the 744 prisoners given the death penalty before it was abolished in 1997, 230 were still waiting for their sentences to be substituted, the Legal Aid Board (LAB) said.

The board said it had already handled and disposed of 514 of the prisoners' appeals for sentence substitution and would expedite the hearings of the outstanding cases.

 "We will expedite the hearings of the outstanding cases by appointing and outsourcing legal representation for those prisoners whose cases must still be heard," LAB spokesman Peter Brits said on Wednesday (SUBS: CORRECT).

 He said several factors had contributed to the delays. One of these was that the law required prisoners on death row to follow all remedies of the judiciary. The appeal process had to be exhausted before the prisoners could apply for sentence reduction.

 This, Brits said, took a lot of time.

 Not all the prisoners were aware that they could apply for sentence reduction. It was also not always easy to get access to case records.

 "In some cases, the original court records were not easily available and in other cases, the process of perusal has been laborious.

 "Certain delays emanated from the lack of understanding by death sentence prisoners of their right to appeal against their death sentences and what was necessary to exercise this right."

 He said a list of prisoners on death row was drawn up in 1998 but delays were caused because the representation of the prisoners were outsourced to private attorneys.

 "But there were delays as initially the bar agreed that this legal aid was to be provided for free but this did not happen.

 "The LAB then provided a compromised fee structure that was agreed and representation was outsourced."

 Brits said the LAB was committed to deal with the remaining death row cases as speedily as possible and without any further delays.