Signal inhibitors in Vale de Judeus until the end of the year

One year after the escape of five inmates from Vale de Judeus, the installation of signal jammers for telecommunications and drones is in the tendering phase for that prison, and is expected to be completed by the end of the year. According to information from the Ministry of Justice to Lusa, the signal jamming pilot project in Vale de Judeus is worth €664,000, and the new lighting system and surveillance towers are also expected to be awarded soon, with the project development already complete.

Following the escape, security improvements were also made at this prison, including video surveillance, reinforced with thermal cameras, infrared cameras, and audio signals for motion detection; and the electrical grid and generators, which already proved their resilience during the blackout of April 28, with no incidents recorded.

Shifts and work shifts were also reorganized to ensure constant surveillance in the yards and rotation of video surveillance cameras (CCTV). Following the security audit of the country's 49 prisons (EPs), ordered by Justice Minister Rita Alarcão Júdice following the Vale de Judeus escape, a plan was approved with security reinforcement measures, "whose implementation has already exceeded 50%," the minister told Lusa.

A new audit report is expected by the end of the year, outlining the measures implemented. Even before that, the management audit report on the Directorate-General for Reintegration and Prison Services (DGRSP), led by the Inspectorate-General of Justice Services, will be released.

"The escape of seven inmates from Vale de Judeus prison should not have happened. (...) Then, we decided not to cry over spilt milk and to take action: not only in Vale de Judeus but in all prisons in the country. We supported our decisions with audits, inspections, knowledge, and experience, and we looked at the problem from a structural and systemic perspective. An audit of the country's 49 prisons had never been conducted before," said the Minister of Justice in a written statement to Lusa.

According to information from the DGRSP, as part of the security reinforcement plan, with an investment of 4.5 million euros, at least one improvement project was carried out in each EP, with interventions on walls, nets, fences, improvements to buildings or video surveillance, among others, with further investments expected to be made in excess of 1.137 million euros.

In terms of human resources, the escape from Vale de Judeus, which was identified as having flaws in the monitoring of surveillance cameras, led to the CCTV cameras in all EPs being permanently monitored by the central services of the DGRSP.

Regarding prison guards, which unions repeatedly say are insufficient in number for the needs and reality of prisons across the country, the training course for 63 new prison guards is scheduled to begin in October of this year, those who were considered suitable among 247 candidates for the 225 vacancies created in the last completed competition.

The Government intends to have a multi-year recruitment and promotion plan to ensure the rejuvenation and attractiveness of the prison guard corps, and is also currently implementing legislative changes to alter the entry regime into the career, to ensure faster hiring.

A reorganization of the EP, healthcare for inmates and the acquisition of safety materials and equipment is still underway.

"We can say that we have a safer, better-managed prison system, better prepared to respond to unforeseen situations—an example of which was the blackout, which resulted in no security consequences. In short: we used the Vale de Judeus prison escape to rethink and improve the system," the minister argued.

On September 7, 2024, the Argentine Rodolfo Lohrmann, the British Mark Roscaleer, the Georgian Shergili Farjiani, and the Portuguese Fábio Loureiro and Fernando Ribeiro Ferreira, all of whom have now been recaptured, fled from Vale de Judeus, in Alcoentre (Azambuja).

The escape from Vale de Judeus led Rita Alarcão Júdice to order an audit of the security of Portuguese prisons and also led to the dismissal of the then director-general of the DGRSP, Rui Abrunhosa Gonçalves, who was replaced on an interim basis by Isabel Leitão, with the new director-general, Orlando Carvalho, having been appointed in the meantime.

The audit identified "deficiencies" in equipment, organization, and resource management. The escape also prompted a Public Prosecutor's Office investigation to determine potential criminal liability.

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