Foreign nationals and non-whites get longer jail terms for sex and drug offences, study shows

Foreign nationals and people from non-white ethnic backgrounds are receiving significantly longer prison sentences than their white Irish peers for sexual offences and drug offences, new research has found.

The study, published on Wednesday, reveals people with an ethnicity other than white were sentenced to 32 months longer in prison for sexual offences than those of white ethnicity – 81 months compared with 49 months.

With controlled drug offences, those with an ethnicity other than white were sentenced to 14 months longer than those recorded as white – 38 months compared with 24 months.

The 'Sometimes I'm Missing the Words' report, from the Irish Penal Reform Trust, found foreign nationals were sentenced to an average of 32 months for controlled drugs offences, compared with a sentence of 23 months for Irish nationals. Foreign nationals jailed for sexual offences were sentenced to an average of 68 months, compared with 52 months for Irish nationals.

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Sentences for attempts or threats to murder, assault, harassment, fraud, robbery and road-traffic offences were similar across all inmates, regardless of nationality or ethnicity.

The study, the first of its kind carried out in the State, reports that foreign nationals and minority ethnic communities are over-represented in the penal system. Members of these groups face “significant challenges across the system”, including isolation, discrimination and barriers to communication, researchers found.

About 15 per cent, or one in seven people, in Irish prisons come from a foreign national background. Nearly three-quarters of all committals in Irish prisons were recorded as white, while 3.8 per cent were reported as being an ethnicity other than white.

Data gaps

However, the Irish Prison Service could not provide ethnicity data for 22 per cent of committals. These “significant gaps” in data meant it was not possible to give an “accurate depiction” of the Irish prison population, the report warned.

While most interviewees reported positive engagement with prison staff, one reported “racially abusive behaviour by individual prison officers”. One told researchers: “If you are from here [Ireland], they treat one way, but if you’re not, they treat you totally different.”

Staff training is a “fundamental element of supporting the rights and needs of minority ethnic, migrant and foreign national prisoners” and must be integrated into prison cultures, said the report.