Number of child inmates in Turkey up 500 percent in five years

ANKARA – Anadolu Agency

HÜRRİYET photo

The number of child inmates in Turkey’s prisons increased by five times between 2010 and 2014, according to newly released data from the Turkish Statistics Institute (TÜİK).

There were a total of 7,595 child convicts in Turkish prisons in 2014, 1,028 of whom were younger than 15 years old. The rate of children between the ages of 12 and 17 in prison compared to the total number of convicts was 4.4 percent in 2014. 

In 2010, the number of child convicts in prison was 1,443, which included 191 convicts between ages of 12 and 14. This number increased to 1,665 in 2011, while the number of convicts in prison between the ages of 12 and 14 rose to 223. The number of child convicts almost doubled in 2012 compared to the previous year, with 3,069 in prison. The number also almost doubled in 2013, when 6,132 child convicts were in jail, including 1,137 between the ages of 12 and 14. 

Meanwhile, the overall number of convicts in jail has also steadily increased over the five years included in the data. 

In 2010, Turkey’s prison population was around 120,000, made up of both convicts and people being held in pre-trial detention. By 2014, this figure had risen to around 170,733, the data also revealed. 

In demographic terms, the data showed that 96.4 percent of the prison population was male in 2014.

Regarding both the number of people imprisoned and the number of people discharged from prison, the data showed the number of persons imprisoned rose by 5 percent in 2014 compared to 2013.

The number of people imprisoned in 2014 was 170,733, compared to 162,000 in 2013.

Standing out as a substantial decrease, the number of people discharged from prison dropped by around 15 percent in 2014 compared to 2013. The number of people released from prison was around 157,000 in 2013, but dropped to around 136,000 in 2014.

The data also hinted at a correlation between education level and criminal activity. 

Some 31.6 percent of convicts in 2014 were only middle school graduates, the data showed.

The data showed 42.2 percent of convicts who had committed theft had completed middle school, while 20.7 percent of them had only completed primary school. 

Some 15.7 percent of the prisoners were recorded as literate but had not graduated from a school, according to the data. 

The data also showed that 31.4 percent of convicts who committed assault had completed middle school and 26.4 percent of them had completed primary school. Assault convicts who had graduated from secondary school made up 20.7 percent of people imprisoned in 2014.