Some 254 suspects arrested during security crackdown in December in the capital Juba will soon be arraigned in court, the police said.
Maj. Gen. Daniel Justin, Spokesperson of the South Sudan Police, told Radio Tamazuj the suspects were arrested alongside the 52 suspects released last week.
“They were all caught but we latter on discovered that some of them were coming or sent to the shops to bring some things home, so the investigation has proved that they are not involved,” he said.
Justin added, “And the 245 are charged and now the investigation is over and the case is going to the court.”
Justin pointed out that the suspects were part of a larger network of gangs that had been terrorizing residents and businesses in Juba and other parts of the country.
He said the 254 other suspects were charged with different offenses ranging from robbery to kidnapping, murder and drug trafficking.
“We have new arrests and the number is 181—they were arrested last week down the line up to this week. We have deployed a lot of forces on the ground such that they are accessible any time. I am appealing to them to continue with their operations,” he said.
Justin said the police operation, launched in December 2023, had resulted in the arrest of hundreds of suspects and the seizure of weapons, drugs, and stolen goods.
He said the operation sought to restore law and order and improving security in the capital, Juba and its environs.
Justin said the police remain determined to end the menace of gangs and criminal activities across the country.
He urged the public to cooperate with police and report of suspicious activities or persons to the police.
The conviction of the suspects only compounds the situation in the already crowded Juba Central Prison, a facility run by the South Sudan National Prisons Service and Juba Central Prison authorities.
Last week it emerged that the facilities faced a major shortage of space to accommodate the more than 2,000 inmates.
In an interview with Radio Tamazuj, Advocate Godfrey Victor Bulla who is an Executive Director for a legal advocacy organization; Justice and Human Rights Observatory (JAHRO) said the facilities were already overstretched.
He said the prison has a capacity of 370 rooms for 370 inmates. However, it is currently holding over 20,000 prisoners, creating poor sanitation and hygiene in the facility.
“To be honest, the capacity of Juba Central Prison is overwhelming. The current numbers of inmates inside the prison overpassed the capacity of the facilities that were constructed by then to accommodate certain numbers, so the numbers have gone even more than the number that it is supposed to accommodate,” Advocate Bulla disclosed.