BBC News - Dame Elish Angiolini to lead women prison inquiry
"Former Lord Advocate Dame Elish Angiolini is to head an inquiry into how women are treated by the Scottish criminal justice system.
The commission will look at better ways of dealing with women offenders.
Sheriff Danny Scullion and Dr Linda de Casetecker will be the other two members of the commission,
Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said.
Scotland's only women's prison, Cornton Vale, has been heavily criticised by inspectors in the past few years.
The commission is being set up in the wake of the most recent inspection report, published in June.
Brigadier Hugh Monro, the chief inspector of prisons, said he had been "very disappointed" at the lack of progress at Cornton Vale.
He inspected the prison in February 2011 as a follow up to a visit in 2009.'Pressing issue'
Many of the problems at the prison - which is designed to house 309 inmates but currently holds almost 400 - were down to overcrowding, the brigadier said.
Speaking on a visit to Cornton Vale, near Stirling, Mr MacAskill said the commission would make recommendations to tackle overcrowding and "ultimately reverse" the rise in the female prison population.
It will report back to the Scottish government by February 2012."
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