Prisoner numbers continue to grow
The number of inmates in Swiss prisons swelled to their second-highest levels in a decade in 2009.
There were 6,084 people in prison in September, 59 per cent of whom were serving a prison sentence and 31 per cent were in pre-trial detention. Another ten per cent were in detention for expulsion and extradition or were being held for other reasons.
Prisons in French- and Italian-speaking parts of Switzerland were 100 per cent full while across the whole country, the occupancy rate rose by five per cent to 91 per cent compared with 2008.
Annual checks of inmate numbers in the country’s 114 prisons are carried out every September in Switzerland.
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