Dutch prisons crisis: Overcrowded cells and corruption concerns

Overcrowded cells and insufficient staff are the problems Dutch prisons are struggling with. Hence, there is an idea to send inmates from facilities in this country to... prisons in other countries. However, this is not the end of the changes that the Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security has planned for the penitentiary system.

The Secretary of State for the Justice Department, Ingrid Coenradie, emphasizes that in recent months, more and more convicted individuals are not ending up in prisons because there is a lack of staff and the cells are overcrowded.

Hence the idea of looking for places abroad. As Coenradie argues, this is not a new idea, as a few years ago Dutch prisons were already taking in convicts from Belgium and Norway.

The future shows that there are possibilities for treaty agreements on this matter, stated the secretary, quoted by Polsat News.

Dutch media report that up to 2,000 people who have received a convicting sentence are at large. This includes both minor offenses and life sentences.

Other changes aimed at solving this problem include an increased number of multi-person cells and the expansion of the monitoring system.

It is unclear to which specific countries the Dutch inmates would be transferred.

According to the reports, nearly 160 employees of Dutch prisons were dismissed between 2020-2023. The reason? Corruption, drug trafficking, having sexual relations with inmates, giving them phones, money, or confidential information.

Another 170 employees in this sector were punished in other ways.

In recent years, the Netherlands has also taken pride in the fact that more and more prisons are closing down and being converted into public utility facilities. The British School in Amsterdam moved into a former prison building with 150,700 ft².

Just 12 miles away, in Haarlem, the former de Koepel prison was converted into social housing as well as conference rooms.