Handcuffing prisoners leaving the courts is in no way intended to humiliate them, the Minister, Mr McDowell, has insisted.
It was a general Prison Service rule, he said, that prisoners should be handcuffed when leaving court precincts because there had been a "high number of incidents involving prisoners, including escape and injuries to staff".
Former Taoiseach Mr John Bruton had asked the Minister if the public handcuffing of prisoners leaving the courts was "part of the punishment of the convicted person" or if it was solely for security purposes.
Mr McDowell stressed that "It is in no way part of the delivery of justice to seek to humiliate people who are or have been before the courts, however serious their crimes or whatever vicarious satisfaction some people may derive from seeing them in handcuffs."
He insisted that the Prison Service did not "endorse or encourage the parading" of prisoners in a way which impinges on their personal dignity, "regardless of their crimes or alleged crimes".
Prison staff are required to respect the dignity of prisoners in their charge at all times and the rules "explicitly require the authorities to avoid prisoners being photographed".
But despite the best efforts of staff, there were "real and practical difficulties in removing prisoners from most of the older court precincts where there is no screened exit away from public view or photographers".
Mr Bruton, in a written parliamentary question, had asked the Minister to publish the handcuffing guidelines.
Explaining the rules, the Minister said that governors and prison staff were allowed some discretion, particularly in relation to "women prisoners and aged or infirm prisoners who pose a low flight risk.
"The nature of the crime for which a prisoner is sentenced is not a factor in their treatment by prison staff."
However, the exercise of discretion depends on which court is used.
The Four Courts "is a difficult setting where hundreds of persons can be committed to custody on a particular day".
For this reason, "the Cloverhill escort party who service the Four Courts invariably handcuff all prisoners and there is a governor's order from the institution directing staff to take that approach".
