The new legislation concerning the enforcement of sentences entered into force on 1 October 2006. At the same time, the structure reform of the Prison Service prepared together with the so-called imprisonment legislation was implemented and, hence, five district prisons and a national health care unit called the Health Services of the Prison Service were established. In the established district prison system, the new assessment and allocation units were responsible for the imprisonment process provided in the new legislation. Simultaneously, the administrative duties were centralised in the five district prisons instead of the former 22 prisons.

Characteristic of the year 2006 were also the drastic changes in the prison population rate: at the end of 2005, the level of 4 000 prisoners was crossed for the first time in twenty years and the prison population rate stayed very high in the early 2006. By the end of 2006, the prison population had lowered to a level similar to what had been a couple of years ago (3 600-3 700) partly due to the effects of the new Act on Imprisonment. The average prison population was 3 788.

The number of life sentence prisoners kept rising. In December, there were 136 life prisoners, which was 12 more than the year before. Prisoners sentenced for violent offences were still the largest group. The number of foreign prisoners was over 300 at the end of the year.

Despite the drastic changes and the high prison population rate at the beginning of the year, the Prison Service was able to maintain its basic functions at a good level. A more balanced use of institution capacity was not yet achieved during the first months of the new organisation and, thus, the closed institutions were still overcrowded.

Prison security remained at a good level in 2006. The number of escapes and attempted escapes declined. There were 14 escapes and 9 attempts from closed prisons. No prisoner escaped from inside the prison walls whereas in the previous year there were ten cases. At the end of the year, three prisoners were at large. In addition to the alertness of the personnel, the decrease in the number of escapes was influenced by, among other things, the improved technical supervision in the institutions, which besides increased the concrete chances of being caught, also had a preventive effect. The personnel’s professional skills to identify critical factors were also further improved.

The Probation Service performed its duties well and achieved its goals despite the fact that the client and service numbers stayed high. In 2006, the Probation Service enforced community sanctions or prepared expert statements of 14 000 different clients with under 300 person-years.

The daily number of community sanction clients decreased a bit compared with the previous year. The decrease concerned especially the amounts of community service clients and conditionally sentenced young offenders. The drop in the number of young community sanction clients reflects the smaller age group sizes and the reduction of traditional crimes among the younger generations. The majority of community service clients were sentenced for drunken driving. The amount of aggravated drunken driving decreased by 4% since the year before.

The Annual Report 2006 with separate statistics appendix is available at www.rikosseuraamus.fi/16927.htm