In the Tahíche prison, 173 prisoners are serving their sentences, a figure that more than doubles the capacity of these facilities, where there are only 79 cells. This is what the Association of Bodies of the Penitentiary Institutions Administration, ACAIP, the union of justice officials, denounces, which has published a report on the prisons that have a higher rate of overcrowding in their facilities. According to this report, the Tahíche center shows a rate of almost 218.99%. This data shows that the number of inmates more than doubles the capacity of the Lanzarote prison.
In the last five months, the number of inmates has increased by 18 more people, so the 173 inmates who are serving sentences today in Tahíche share the 79 cells enabled for the stay of the prisoners. In individual cells, two inmates sleep and in those with more people, up to twice as many inmates as there should be live together.
The overcrowding of prisoners is not only a problem on the island, but it is reproduced in all penitentiary centers in the country. According to the ACAIP report, there are 31,900 places for inmates in the 66 Spanish prisons, but the number of prisoners who depend on the General Directorate of Penitentiary Institutions, a body within the Ministry of the Interior, exceeds 54,000 at the moment. These data indicate that Spanish prisons are almost at 170% of their possibilities.
The Tahíche prison is in eleventh place, below Pamplona and four tenths above the Las Palmas penitentiary center. According to the data offered in the study, the prisons of Santander and Ceuta lead the list, with a overcrowding that exceeds 300% of their capacity.
The report also places the 28 penitentiary centers with the highest number of prisoners, among which is the 15th the Las Palmas prison with 1,399 prisoners in the 640 functional cells available. The list is headed by the Valencia prison with 2,343 inmates, followed at a certain distance by the Soto del Real prison in Madrid with 1,749.
