Death in custody is when a person dies when in the custody of the police

Police

The police is a personification of the state designated to put in practice the enforced law, protect property and reduce civil disorder in civilian matters. Their powers include the legitimized use of force...

, prison service or other authorities. Death in custody remains a controversial subject, with the authorities often being accused of abuse, neglect, racism and cover-ups of the causes of these deaths.http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/167/10/1127 http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/reprint/167/10/1127.pdf

Bangladesh

At least 32 people have died in "Operation Clean Heart" by the government of Bangladesh.See Human rights in Bangladesh

Human rights in Bangladesh

In 2005, Bangladesh experienced an unprecedented period of continuous political instability. OnAugust 17, 2005, four hundred bombs exploded in all but one of the nation's sixty-four districts...

China

Some estimate 20 million have died in the Chinese prison system. See Laogai

Laogai

Laogai , the abbreviation for Láodòng Gǎizào , which means "reform through labor," is a slogan of the Chinese criminal justice system and has been used to refer to the use of prison labor and prison farms in the People's Republic of China . It is estimated that in the last fifty years more than...

, democide

Democide

Democide is a term revived and redefined by the political scientist R. J. Rummel as "the murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder." Rummel created the term as an extended concept to include forms of government murder that are not covered by the...

.

Jamaica

"At least 650 people have been killed by police officers in Jamaica since 1999. Many of these have been blatantly unlawful killings, yet not one officer has been convicted since then."
Piers Bannister, Amnesty International

Amnesty International

Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...

’s Jamaica researcher.

Japan

Of the 1,592 deaths in Japanese prisons, 1992-2002, 68 required autopsies due to questionable circumstances.http://www.debito.org/arrestperiods.html#prison See Human rights in Japan

Human rights in Japan

Japan is a constitutional monarchy. According to Ministry of Justice figures, the Japanese Legal Affairs Bureau offices and civil liberties volunteers dealt with 359,971 human rights related complaints and 18,786 reports of suspected human rights violations during 2003...

South Africa

South Africa has an unusually high level of deaths in custody. For example in April to June 1997, there were 56 deaths in custody http://www.csvr.org.za/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1448:a-lonely-way-to-die-an-examination-of-deaths-in-police-custody&catid=138:publications&Itemid=2.

• Neil Aggett
  Neil Aggett
  Neil Aggett was a white South African trade union leader and labour activist who died whilst in detention after being arrested by the South African Security Police.-Life and Death:...
  
  
• Richard Turner
  Rick Turner (philosopher)
  Richard Turner , known as Rick Turner, was a South African philosopher who was allegedly assassinated by the apartheid state in 1978. Nelson Mandela described Turner "as a source of inspiration".-Life:...
  
  
• Steve Biko
  Steve Biko
  Stephen Biko was a noted anti-apartheid activist in South Africa in the 1960s and 1970s. A student leader, he later founded the Black Consciousness Movement which would empower and mobilize much of the urban black population. Since his death in police custody, he has been called a martyr of the...
  
  

USA

Almost 100 prisoners have died in U.S. custody in Iraq and Afghanistan since August 2002, according to U.S. group Human Rights First

Human Rights First

Human Rights First is a nonprofit, nonpartisan human rights organization based in New York City and Washington, D.C....

. They include:

• Jamal Naseer
  Jamal Naseer
  Jamal Nasser was an Afghan soldier who died in United States' custody on March 16, 2003.In 2004, eighteen months after his death, when his death in custody was brought to the attention of American headquarters, his death was attributed to a kidney infection.Later, an investigation determined that...
  
  
• Nagem Hatab
  Nagem Hatab
  Nagem Hatab was an Iraqi who died while in US custody. Hatab is said to have been a Ba'ath party member.-Arrest:Hatab was arrested in a bazaar where he was trying to sell a US Army issue M16 rifle. The serial number of this rifle showed it was one issued to a member of the unit that included...
  
  

See also

• Institutional racism
  Institutional racism
  Institutional racism describes any kind of system of inequality based on race. It can occur in institutions such as public government bodies, private business corporations , and universities . The term was coined by Black Power activist Stokely Carmichael in the late 1960s...
  
  

:Category:People who died in police custody
:Category:People who died in prison custody

• List of killings by law enforcement officers in the United States
• List of freedom indices