The Department of Corrections ( th, กรมราชทัณฑ์, ) is an agency of the Thai Ministry of Justice. Its mission is to keep prisoners in custody and rehabilitate them. Its headquarters is in Suanyai Sub-district,

Mueang Nonthaburi District Mueang Nonthaburi ( th, เมืองนนทบุรี, , ) is the capital district ('' amphoe mueang'') of Nonthaburi province in Thailand. The city of Nonthaburi has 267,001 inhabitants, while the whole district has 348,553. History The ...

, Nonthaburi Province. , Police Colonel Suchart Wongananchai is director-general of the department. Its FY2019 budget was 13,430 million

baht The baht (; th, บาท, ; currency sign, sign: ฿; ISO 4217, code: THB) is the official currency of Thailand. It is divided into 100 ''satang'' (, ). The issuance of currency is the responsibility of the Bank of Thailand. Society for Worldw ...

Prisons and prison population

World map of prison population rates from World Prison Brief

* Despite its population of only 70 million, Thailand ranks sixth in the world in prison population. * Thailand's female incarceration rate is the world's highest at 66.4 female convicts per 100,000 inhabitants. * The department manages 143 or 144 central prisons, provincial prisons, district prisons and other correctional facilities across

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

, housing some 45,796 female (13.7 percent) and 288,483 male prisoners. Overcrowding has been reported at 143 prisons. The official capacity of all Thai prisons was 217,000 . By early 2020 the prison population had grown to 374,052 inmates, 288,648 of them drug offenders. Various remedies have been put forth to lower the prison population. Among them are fines or rehabilitation programs in lieu of prison time, community service in lieu of fines,

ankle monitor The ankle, or the talocrural region, or the jumping bone (informal) is the area where the foot and the leg meet. The ankle includes three joints: the ankle joint proper or talocrural joint, the subtalar joint, and the inferior tibiofibular join ...

home confinement, decriminalization of

marijuana Cannabis, also known as marijuana among other names, is a psychoactive drug from the cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, the cannabis plant has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various tra ...

, and more suspended sentences. * Overcrowded prisons result in meager food rations for inmates. The prison food and cooking gas budget in place since 2013 is 49 baht per day per inmate, but is capped at an average prison population of 190,200, far fewer than the more than 350,000 inmates held in June 2018. Many prisoners find it hard live on only state-provided food so, if they can afford it, they are permitted to spend up to 300 baht per day in prison shops. * Eight of Thailand's prisons have all-female inmate populations. The remaining prisons have both male and female inmates, kept segregated in separate zones. Transsexuals number about 4,500 in Thai prisons. They are housed with male inmates, but some have separate sleeping quarters. * According to the Department of Corrections, more than half of those incarcerated are there for an "offense against

narcotic The term narcotic (, from ancient Greek ναρκῶ ''narkō'', "to make numb") originally referred medically to any psychoactive compound with numbing or paralyzing properties. In the United States, it has since become associated with opiates ...

s law". Some news reports say that the percentage is closer to 80 percent. The number is January 2020 is 288,648 drug offenders out of 374,052 total inmates, or 77 percent. * Foreigners accounted for 4.6 percent of the prison population in September 2016. 14,275 foreign inmates from 103 countries were held in Thai prisons. * Thailand's

incarceration rate This is a list of countries and some dependent territories and subnational areas by incarceration rate. * In 2018, the DOC signed an agreement with

Krung Thai Bank Krungthai Bank ( th, ธนาคารกรุงไทย; ), officially Krungthai Bank Public Company Limited, and sometimes known by its initials KTB, is a state-owned bank under license issued by the Ministry of Finance (Thailand), Ministry ...

(KTB) to provide bank accounts to prisoners. In a trial run, up to 10,000 prisoners will be permitted to use KTB accounts for ATM withdrawals and e-banking. If successful, the program will be rolled out to all prisons. Until now, prison wardens have managed deposits from relatives of prisoners, enabling them to buy items ranging from soap to snacks at prison shops. The new program will remove wardens from inmate financial transactions, as some wardens have been accused of siphoning money from prisoner accounts. In one case, it is alleged that a 500 baht commission was taken by prison management from a 3,000 baht transaction. * In 2015, the

recidivism Recidivism (; from ''recidive'' and ''ism'', from Latin ''recidīvus'' "recurring", from ''re-'' "back" and ''cadō'' "I fall") is the act of a person repeating an undesirable behavior after they have experienced negative consequences of th ...

rate of Thai prisoners was 17 percent. In 2016 that rate rose to 25 percent and 33 percent in 2017. Most were imprisoned more than once for drug-related crimes. Of Thailand's roughly 350,000 prisoners, 180,000 of them first-time offenders, 60,000 second-time offenders and 15,000 third-time offenders. In some prisons, like Rayong Central Prison, about 90 percent of inmates are jailed for drug offences.

Facilities

Bang Kwang Central Prison Bang Kwang Central Prison ( th, เรือนจำกลางบางขวาง; ) is a men's prison in Nonthaburi Province, Thailand, on the Chao Phraya River about 11 km north of Bangkok. It is a part of the Department of Correct ...

* Central Women's Correctional Institution * Chiang Mai Women's Correctional Institution * Chiang Rai Central Prison* (* signifies model women's prison) * Chonburi Women's Correctional Institution* * Fang District Prison* *

Klong Prem Central Prison Klong Prem Central prison ( th, เรือนจํากลางคลองเปรม; ) is a maximum security prison in Chatuchak District, Bangkok, Thailand. The prison has several separate sections. The compound houses up to 20,000 in ...

(Includes a prison for women) * Lang Suan Prison, Chumphon Province * Nakhon Ratchasima Women's Correctional Institution * Phitsanulok Women's Correctional Institution* * Phra Nakon Si Ayutthaya Provincial Prison* *

Rayong Central Prison Crime in Thailand has been a defining issue in the country for decades, inspiring years of policy and international criticism. Drug use and Corruption in Thailand, corruption make up the majority of the crime in Thailand and due to this, many Thai ...

* Samut Sakhon Central Prison* * Songkhla Women's Correctional Institution * Tak Central Prison* * Thanya Buri Women’s Penitentiary* * Thon Buri Women's Correctional Institution * Women's Correctional Institution for Drug Addicts Bang Kwang houses Thailand's death row for men and execution chamber.Wongruang, Piyapor
When the Killing Hour Arrives
"
Page 2
. ''

Bangkok Post The ''Bangkok Post'' is an English-language daily newspaper published in Bangkok, Thailand. It is published in broadsheet and digital formats. The first issue was sold on 1 August 1946. It had four pages and cost one baht, a considerable amount ...

''. 30 August 2009. Retrieved on 4 July 2016
Former URL
/ref> The Klong Prem (Lard Yao) section for women houses female death row inmates.

Overcrowding

The

International Committee of the Red Cross The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC; french: Comité international de la Croix-Rouge) is a humanitarian organization which is based in Geneva, Switzerland, and it is also a three-time Nobel Prize Laureate. State parties (signato ...

(ICRC) puts the minimum space requirement for inmate accommodation at 3.4 m² per person in a shared or dormitory accommodation. The Department of Corrections has three different inmate space standards for its prisons: the "standard capacity" spacing regulation is 2.25 m² floor space for each prisoner. "Full capacity" spacing is 1.1 m² per female inmate, 1.2 m² per male inmate. "Full capacity 30%" sets the spacing at 0.85 m² per inmate. These guidelines allow the DOC to manipulate prison occupancy numbers. When the Director-General of the Department of Corrections says—as he did in December 2019—that the 700,000 inmates behind bars are three times the capacity of the prisons it is unclear which capacity standard he is using. In December 2019, a video was released on YouTube showing a crowded cell at the Lang Suan Prison in Chumphon Province.

Justice Minister A justice ministry, ministry of justice, or department of justice is a ministry or other government agency in charge of the administration of justice. The ministry or department is often headed by a minister of justice (minister for justice in a v ...

Somsak Thepsuthin's response was to tell the prison to file a police complaint of an alleged hacking of the video system. He directed the

Department of Special Investigation The Department of Special Investigation (DSI) is a department of the Ministry of Justice of Thailand. It operates independently of the Royal Thai Police and is tasked with the investigation of certain "special cases". These include complex crimi ...

(DSI) to find out how it happened and who was responsible on the grounds that the leak may have violated the rights of inmates. Somsak's attitude has changed somewhat when he realised—as he put it—that some inmates have "...less room for a body o sleep inthan the inside of a coffin,..."

LGBT facility

The Department of Corrections is moving towards separating lesbian, gay, bisexual, and

transgender A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through tr ...

(

LGBT ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is a ...

) prisoners from other prisoners to ensure their safety and security.

Min Buri Min Buri ( th, มีนบุรี, ) is one of the 50 districts (''khet'') of Bangkok, Thailand. It is bounded by other Bangkok districts (from north clockwise): Khlong Sam Wa, Nong Chok, Lat Krabang, Saphan Sung, and Khan Na Yao. Min Buri ...

Prison will be used as a prison for LGBT prisoners under a pilot scheme. There are 4,448 prisoners self-identified as LGBT: 2,258 females, 2,156 males, and 34 transgender individuals. LGBT inmates account for about one percent of Thailand's total of 300,000 prisoners.

Death penalty

Thailand, as of 2018, is one of 58 nations that retain the death penalty. Of the 10

ASEAN ASEAN ( , ), officially the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, is a political and economic union of 10 member states in Southeast Asia, which promotes intergovernmental cooperation and facilitates economic, political, security, militar ...

nations, only

Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand t ...

and the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

have outlawed it. Thailand retains the death penalty, but rarely employs it. Since 1935 Thailand has executed 326 persons, 319 by

firing squad Execution by firing squad, in the past sometimes called fusillading (from the French ''fusil'', rifle), is a method of capital punishment, particularly common in the military and in times of war. Some reasons for its use are that firearms are us ...

(the last was shot on 11 December 2003), and seven by

lethal injection Lethal injection is the practice of injecting one or more drugs into a person (typically a barbiturate, paralytic, and potassium solution) for the express purpose of causing rapid death. The main application for this procedure is capital puni ...

, the latest on 19 June 2018. , 517 persons remain on death row. Bang Khwang Central Prison contains the nation's primary

Death Row Death row, also known as condemned row, is a place in a prison that houses inmates awaiting Capital punishment, execution after being convicted of a capital crime and sentenced to death. The term is also used figuratively to describe the state of ...

, but Death Rows exist in provincial prisons, for both men and women. , 59 women are on death row, 58 of them for drug-related offenses. Even after the Supreme Court has handed down a death sentence, under Thai law it can be stayed by the king if a petition is sent to the palace within 60 days. The king can then ponder the petition indefinitely. King

Bhumibol Bhumibol Adulyadej ( th, ภูมิพลอดุลยเดช; ; ; (Sanskrit: ''bhūmi·bala atulya·teja'' - "might of the land, unparalleled brilliance"); 5 December 192713 October 2016), conferred with the title King Bhumibol the Great ...

(Rama IX), effectively halted executions in Thailand for nearly a decade by this means. Petitions submitted by condemned prisoners were left unanswered by the palace, leading prison officials to regard them as "under royal deliberation". They did not dare put petitioners to death lest they were seen as intruding on royal prerogative. More than 500 death row inmates were thus spared death. On the other hand, when the king rejects clemency petitions, the prisoner must be put to death within 24 hours. Thai public opinion on the death penalty is unclear. A 2014 survey reported that only eight percent of the population favored its abolition. Another survey indicated that 41 percent wanted to retain the death penalty as a sentencing option. Prime Minister

Prayut Chan-o-cha Prayut Chan-o-cha (sometimes spelled Prayuth Chan-ocha; th, ประยุทธ์ จันทร์โอชา, ; born 21 March 1954) is a Thai politician and retired Royal Thai Army, army officer who has served as the Prime Minister of T ...

has said that the death penalty is necessary to maintain peace and order and deter severe crimes in spite of general acknowledgement that the possibility of execution does not serve to deter crime.

Parole

The corrections department has three criteria for granting parole to inmates: * Exhibiting good behaviour * Performing community service, e.g, repairing roads, dredging canals * Royal pardon Two conditions are attached: The inmate must have served at least six months of an ordinary sentence, or—if sentenced to life—the inmate must have served at least 10 years of that sentence. One

serial killer A serial killer is typically a person who murders three or more persons,A * * * * with the murders taking place over more than a month and including a significant period of time between them. While most authorities set a threshold of three ...

was originally sentenced to death in 2005. He confessed to the crime, thus resulting in the commutation of his sentence to life. He then served 14 years of his life sentence and during that time received four sentence reductions for good behaviour. He was then granted parole on a "special national occasion." Seven months after he was paroled he committed murder and was rearrested.

References

External links

Department of Corrections
Government departments of Thailand Prison and correctional agencies Ministry of Justice (Thailand) Penal system in Thailand {{Thailand-stub