By MONSURU OLOWOOPEJO

LAGOS— THE Lagos State government said 611 offenders have been sentenced to various terms of community service across the 12 magisterial districts of the state, in the last one year.

The state government also said that 35 unhygienic food premises were sealed for constituting environmental nuisance, within the last 100 days.

Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Ade Ipaye, disclosed this in Agege area, one of the venues for the stakeholders forum held across the three senatorial districts in the state, to mark the 2,400 days of the present administration.

Ipaye said this was part of the state government’s effort to decongest prisons in the state.

It would be recalled that the state at the last ministerial press briefing held last year to mark the sixth year in office of Governor Babatunde Fashola-led administration, said 1,154 offenders were sentenced to community service in the last seven years.

Ipaye noted: “This is under the state community service project,” adding that community service is a non-custodial punishment enshrined in the state’s criminal law, and was one of its strategies aimed at ensuring speedy dispensation of justice.

He explained that through the community service, which requires offenders to do some community work, the state government has succeeded in de-congesting the prison system without compromising the justice administration system.

According to him, the state government also “facilitated the decongestion of prisons through speeding up the treatment of police investigation case files sent in for legal advice, and so far, work has been completed on 290 police investigation files out of the 333 files sent in within the period under review.”

Ipaye said “The state government provided free legal service and defence of human rights, through the CMC which handled 7290 cases, Office of the Public Defender, OPD; 1,039 cases and the human rights protection unit treated 753 human rights complain in the last 100 days.”