Sardinian prisons are overbooked, with 2,608 inmates for 2,583 places. This represents significant year-over-year growth, with numbers highlighting the real surprise: foreigners are currently numbering 795, or 30.48%, compared to 581 in 2024, or 25.3% of the total.
This was made known by Maria Grazia Caligaris, president of the association Socialismo Diritti Riforme , who examined data from the Statistics Office of the Ministry of Justice updated to 30 November 2025.
"It is also worth noting," Caligaris notes, "that the highest concentration of foreign prisoners is concentrated in the two main prisons, 374 (47%) . In fact, there are 190 in Cagliari-Uta out of 739 inmates for 561 places. The situation is more serious in Sassari-Bancali, where there are 184 out of 566 inmates for 458 places. A higher percentage is recorded in Mamone-Onanì, with a presence of 192 inmates for 264 places (58.3%) ."
According to the association's president, "while the region, across all its administrative and political branches, as well as the associations, are seeking a way forward through dialogue to prevent the newly completed 41bis wing in Cagliari-Uta from being filled with another 92 maximum-security inmates, the government, through the Ministry of Justice and the Department of Penitentiary Administration (DAP), is pursuing its plan to transform Sardinia into a penitentiary slavery . To the nearly 800 foreign inmates, another 700, almost all Sicilians and Calabrians, are serving their sentences in high security. The island's inmates, none of whom are under 41bis and very few are AS, number just over a thousand, confirming that local criminal activity is very different from that expressed through the Mafia, the 'Ndrangheta, and the Stidda."
" A concerted effort by local institutions and the entire political class has become imperative ," Caligaris concluded, "to stem a phenomenon that starkly contradicts the island's hopes for economic and social growth. Treating this problem as residual only further fuels Sardinia's depopulation and attributes its role to a completely marginal one." Caligaris therefore appeals to institutions and political leaders of all backgrounds to "bring the issue to the national level and to the State-Regions Conference."
(Unioneonline)