Incomplete reports delay ruling on ill prisoners

By HEZRON KISING
MORE than 20 prisoners experiencing mental illness appeared in the Bomana District Court yesterday for court to decide about their release in Port Moresby.
Justice Panuel Mogish said that experiencing mental illness needed their family and people who could look after them to help their recovery.
The court noticed that their reports from the Bomana prison and medical history from the Laloki Psychiatric Hospital were sketchy and incomplete.
Justice Mogish adjourned the matter to September 19, giving time for the two institutions to provide updated and complete records and reports for the detainees’ health conditions.
The court asked Correctional Services to make funding available for their repatriation.
The court was told that some of the inmates were transferred to Laloki hospital for treatment.
Doctors’ reports indicated that they had recovered well before returning to prison. However, when in detention they developed mental illness again.
Justice Mogish said living in confined cells in prison was not helping them recover well so the detainees should be repatriated to their respective provinces. He said they were citizens of PNG and they were human beings like every other person.
“Therefore, we should treat them well, look after them and help them. For those of us in authority, we should do what is best for them,” the judge said.
The court told CS officers in Bomana to provide some nutritious food for them once in a while because the medicine they were taking was too strong.