Inmates serve time in shadow of surveillance
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The trial operation of an electronic monitoring network recently began at a prison in Guangdong province's Huizhou city in an effort to prevent inmates from attempting to commit suicide.
The surveillance network, which will gradually spread across the province, was built at a cost of 20 million yuan ($2.95 million), according to a report in the Nanfang Daily.
With the network, prison officers will be able to maintain a 24-hour watch on prison corridors, the entrance to the prison and the surrounding area.
The command center of the network has 29 sub-stations where dozens of personnel watch the cameras, alarms and access to the prison.
If an inmate dies unnaturally, the "information-powered management mode" will produce videos to facilitate the investigation and clarify the cause of death, said prison deputy warden Lai Guozhu,.
"The only way to convince people is with evidence and reasoning," Lai said.
There has been a significant drop in the number of disputes inside the prison since the surveillance network was put in operation, he said.
"On one hand, we have separated accomplices to prevent gangs. On the other, the 24-hour monitoring network discourages them from misbehaving" Lai said.
The surveillance network effectively prevents irregularities from taking place in the punishment and reward system for inmates, said Ouyang Weiguan, another deputy warden at the prison.
Conventionally, inmates tend to be punished or rewarded arbitrarily and the system lacks supervision, which results in corruption, such as prisoners paying officers to have their terms reduced.
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