The death of a prisoner who accidentally overdosed on a cocktail of illicit drugs should prompt an audit of policies to combat substance abuse in Northern Ireland’s jails, a watchdog said today.
The effectiveness of an action plan introduced by the Prison Service to cut smuggling and dealing within jails must be assessed to see how widespread the problem is, according to Prisoner Ombudsman Pauline McCabe.
The recommendation is one of nine made by Ms McCabe on the back of her investigation into the death inside Maghaberry prison, Co Antrim of Alan Ruddy (29) from Newry in January 2008.
She said health authorities also need to improve procedures for establishing inmates’ medical history on their committal to jail and ensure senior medics have an input when deciding whether to take a prisoner off round-the-clock suicide watch.
“I hope that the findings of this Report may also help to prevent similar deaths in future at Maghaberry or elsewhere in the Northern Ireland Prison Service,” said Ms McCabe.
Prison Service director Robin Masefield has accepted all of the ombudsman’s recommendations and said lessons had been learnt from the incident.
Ruddy, who was serving eight months for assault, was found dead by his cell mate the morning after he took at least eight pills. A post-mortem examination found he had morphine, diazepam, amitriptyline and traces of cannabis in his system.
The prisoner, who had a history of depression and was also taking a string of prescription drugs, was admitted to hospital in Belfast three weeks before his death after claiming he had overdosed on his medication.
But medics later decided he had not ingested the amount of tablets he had told staff, and had instead exaggerated the incident in an effort to force prison authorities to re-prescribe him one of the drugs he had been denied since being jailed.
After that he was removed from monitoring scheme for prisoners at risk of self harm - but the Ombudsman found that no doctor or psychiatrist was involved in this decision.
In regard to the incident that eventually killed Ruddy, a doctor concluded it was not a deliberate overdose or suicide attempt.
Ombudsman investigators who listened to recordings of calls made by Ruddy in the days prior to his death said there was evidence he was trying to get money transferred into other inmates’ accounts to pay for the illicit drugs he was accessing in prison.
“The evidence indicated that Mr Ruddy had not intended to take his own life but had inadvertently overdosed by taking a large number of non-prescribed pills of unknown origin, which combined with his prescribed medication to produce fatal effects,” said Ms McCabe.
Of her nine recommendations she said: “Most importantly, I recommend a review of progress of the Prison Service Action Plan in response to its Report on Minimising the Supply of Drugs in Northern Ireland Prisons, which was produced in July 2008.
“I also recommend that the Prison Service and Health Trust further review the arrangements for supporting and referring prisoners with drug addiction problems for specialist services.
“The Prison Service has accepted my recommendations and we will take time to consider their response.
Mr Masefield thanked the Ombudsman for her report and stressed that the Prison Service takes its duty of care very seriously.
PA