There is a saying: “Justice delayed is justice denied.” The perception of a continuing failure of the Philippine criminal justice system to deliver fast and efficient justice has inevitably led to the erosion of public trust in the government. As a consequence, citizens are laden with anxiety because of unabated criminality and violence in their communities. The type of justice that leads to peace and prosperity continues to be elusive in the Philippines as the worsening scenario of jail congestion continues to manifest its malevolent implications for the human rights of prisoners. It appears that the culprit is an overwhelmed machinery of criminal justice that has not been able to keep pace with growing rates of population, urbanization and criminality. There is also an apparent imbalance in the justice structure where there are too few judges, prosecutors and public defence attorneys to process the cases filed by the numerous law enforcers who file criminal cases. This leads to bottlenecks in criminal justice procedures and has resulted, in not a few instances, in human rights crises in jails. However, emerging developments give some hope to Filipinos.

This article charts the rapid rise in the use of imprisonment in recent decades before considering some of the most pressing issues of concern in the use of imprisonment today. First among these is prison overcrowding, which continues to blight the record of many countries in their treatment of prisoners. To illustrate the potentially dire consequences of overcrowding – a problem common to many other countries and regions – an account is given of a recent visit to a prison in El Salvador. The article then provides an overview of the relevant regional and international standards on the treatment of prisoners, referring also to the role of judicial bodies in ensuring implementation.

Visiting an overcrowded prison is a journey into the private life of each person deprived of his or her freedom, into the community of the detainees and of the staff working in such a place. Using the senses of sight, hearing, smell and touch, combined with empathy and time for observation, helps ICRC delegates to explore vulnerabilities, discover how detainees and staff cope, and grasp the intricate complexity of such a prison system. Beyond what is left of human dignity in these places of detention, when coping mechanisms become survival mechanisms, the suffering shows that overcrowding is wrong. It follows that if overcrowding is “nobody's fault”, it is the responsibility of every individual and every institution of the criminal justice system to create solutions.