A former prisoner has accused Jersey’s prison complaints system of marking its own homework after alleging that complaints he made about the Prison Service were referred back to the service itself.
Former Central Market jeweller Darius Pearce was jailed for seven-and-a-half years for three counts of money laundering in 2021.
His complaint, submitted to the Commissioner for Standards, alleges that complaints about prison conduct, disciplinary matters and categorisation decisions are routinely referred back to the Prison Service itself rather than being investigated independently.
Mr Pearce argues this creates “an obvious and fundamental procedural defect” because “the subject of the complaint is effectively being permitted to investigate itself”.
The complaint centres on what Mr Pearce describes as a persistent failure to provide a “procedurally fair and independent mechanism” for investigating complaints.
In the document submitted to the Commissioner for Standards, Mr Pearce claims he has repeatedly raised concerns about alleged misconduct by prison officers, bias and conflicts of interest in disciplinary proceedings, failures in categorisation procedures, and inadequate explanations for decisions affecting his treatment and conditions within the prison system.
He further alleges that disciplinary proceedings were initiated and decided by individuals who were “conflicted, connected to prior disputes, or otherwise incapable of acting impartially”.
The complaint states that the Home Affairs Minister failed to ensure an independent investigation of serious complaints concerning the Prison Service and has undermined public confidence in the impartial administration of the prison system.
Mr Pearce’s submission also refers to a previous Court of Appeal ruling in which the Prison Service was found to have breached his human rights after he attended his father’s funeral in handcuffs.
The Court of Appeal ruled that he was forced to attend the event in restraints due to a risk assessment that was “incapable of justification”.
Mr Pearce said that prison escort and risk assessment policies were later revised following the judgment – including changes intended to provide more individualised assessments concerning risk, proportionality and compassionate release arrangements.
However, the former jeweller claims that despite those policy changes, “no genuinely independent complaints mechanism outside of the Prison Service itself appears to have been established”.
His complaint calls for an investigation into whether the Home Affairs Minister’s conduct amounts to a breach of the Ministerial Code.
Mr Pearce says the issue raises wider questions about “whether Jersey’s prison complaints system is capable of independent scrutiny when fundamental rights are engaged”.
A spokesperson for the Department for Justice and Home Affairs said the department was “aware of the correspondence sent to media outlets, which relates to a complaint by a former prisoner”.
The spokesperson added: “Complaints against Ministers under the Ministerial Code are dealt with by the Commissioner for Standards in accordance with the Commissioner’s code.
“Section 19 provides that complaints should be treated in confidence until they have been considered and an outcome determined. The Minister is therefore not able to comment further at this time.”
