(ANSA) - Naples, Septembers 21 - Some 22% of the inmates who were able to walk free from Italians jails thanks to a July 2006 amnesty have returned to prison, according to a report from the Department of Prisons.
However, despite the return of these criminals the percentage of repeat offenders in Italian jails has declined from 44% before the pardon to 42% today, the report added.
A total of 26,752 inmates have so far benefited from the amnesty, of whom 6,194 are back in jail, 4,318 of them Italians.
There are currently 46,118 inmates in Italian prisons with 17,369 serving definitive sentences, 15,718 awaiting a verdict from their first trial and the rest awaiting appeal or serving life sentences.
At the time parliament passed the amnesty, Italy's prison population numbered some 60,000.
Of the pardoned inmates who have returned to jail, 4,939 were caught in the act of committing a crime.
