A 13 year old boy was told by a judge yesterday that if she sent him to St Patrick's Institution, as punishment for a series of breakins, he would be locked up 23 hours a day and raped every night.
At Carlow District Court, Judge Mary Martin told the juvenile offender: "You will be put in with two or three others and they will rape you every night and will probably hold a blade up to your throat."
The judge said she had a young man before her recently who had been raped in St Patrick's.
"Prison is a dreadful place, there are dreadful things going on there at present," she said.
Judge Martin was trying to encourage the youth to accept the offer of a month's assessment at Oberstown House in Lusk, Co Dublin.
The youth had to give his consent to a month's stay there.
At first the juvenile refused to give his consent. Judge Martin explained this would leave her no option but to send him to St Patrick's Institution, after he had completed one week of assessment in Oberstown.
The boy eventually agreed to the one month stay in Oberstown House.
He was charged with stealing goods valued at £2,500 when he carried out a number of breakins within a couple of hundred yards of his home. The case was put back to the July 7th sitting in Carlow.
