January 31, 1996
Web posted at: 10:30 p.m. EST (0330 GMT)
From Correspondent Brent Sadler
MOSCOW (CNN) -- In the hard and crowded world of Russian prisons, the Mozhaisk work camp outside Moscow is home to a growing number of women inmates. The sharp increase in women behind bars has also brought attention to declining conditions in the country's prisons. Inmates live in filth and chaos, according to reformers.
In a country with a long history of inhumane prison regimes, there seems to evidence to convince human rights activists that conditions are improving.
Yet, it was amid a reported explosion in serious crimes committed by women in Russia that the Interior Ministry opened the gates of one labor camp to a large number of journalists.
Last year alone, more than 5,600 women were convicted of murder.
The Mozhaisk work camp, 70 miles west of Moscow, has its share of killers, including an 18-year-old serving five years for murdering a girlfriend. "Since coming here, I've got even worse. I'm more aggressive and very depressed," she said.
Authorities had a two-fold purpose in giving the tour: Raising awareness of the surge in female crime, and attempting to improve the image of Russian jails.
But penal reformers are not impressed. "In the past five years prison conditions have gotten progressively worse. Human rights violations are systematic and scandalous," says Valery Abramkin of the Moscow Center for Prison Reform.
In the Mozhaisk camp, authorities displayed a clean and orderly sleeping area, complete with a few home comforts and a sleeping cat.
Parts of the prison were especially spruced up for the occasion, which provided only a narrow, sanitized glimpse of a grim penal system in need of widespread reform.
"This place is really terrible," said Olga, a convicted thief. They're only trying to make it look good because you're here."
Moscow's nightly police patrols have logged a steady increase in female crime. The city is fertile ground for women attracted to profits from drugs and prostitution.
At precinct headquarters in Moscow Wednesday, the holding pens contain all women. This new catch of offenders will be processed, adding to the already overburdened judicial system in which more than a quarter of a million prisoners wait months, even years for trial.
In addition to that figure, Russia's population of convicted men and women now stands at around 1 million. They exist, say reformers, in an archaic system which is as decrepit as the jails which hold them.
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