Sharma: Calculation of remission incorrect
THE Fiji Human Rights and Anti-Discrimination Commission (FHRADC) says the Fiji Corrections Service has been incorrectly calculating when a prisoner has to be released early based on the inmate’s right to receive a one-third remission.
FHRADC chairman Pravesh Sharma stated that in the absence of a parole board, serving prisoners could still have an early release through “sentence remission”.
“The mechanism for early release has been highlighted in two landmark judgments by Fiji’s highest court, the Supreme Court, in 2023,” Mr Sharma said.
“The Supreme Court’s clarification sets a correct formula in place to calculate the early release based on inmate’s right to receive a one-third remission’ of their sentence.”
Mr Sharma said the practice of the service for some years had been to apply the entitlement to remission only to the sentence remaining to be served after the non-parole period has been completed.
“This method of calculation was incorrect.
“If an inmate has been given a non-parole period, then the computation of the one third remission still applies. But if the non-parole period exceeds two thirds of a prison sentence, then the inmate must serve until the end of the non-parole period, but must be released immediately at the end of the non-parole period.”
Mr Sharma said as an example, if a person had been sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment, then under section 27 of the 2006 Act, that inmate would be entitled to a remission of four years, being one third of the full term of 12 years.
“In ordinary circumstances the inmate would be released for good behaviour after serving eight years.
“However, if the inmate was given a sentence of 12 years with a non-parole period of nine years, then that inmate must serve the compulsory nine years and then must be released at the end of the non-parole period of nine years.”