A novel method of trying to get drugs into Cork Prison was at the centre of the latest protest by inmates, who refused to return to their cells after an exercise period in the jail on Wednesday.
Seven years ago the prison exercise yard was open to the skies, but prisoners capitalised on this by getting friends on the outside to send drugs over the wall in footballs and tennis balls. The practice had become so widespread that the prison authorities covered the yard with netting.
Recently, however, ingenious accomplices outside had begun to cut tiny holes in light bulbs, fill them with ecstasy tablets or cannabis and cover the holes with tape. When the light bulbs were lobbed over they usually broke on the netting and the ecstasy and cannabis came showering down on the prisoners beneath.
By the time prison officers could intervene in the scramble to collect the drugs, usually there was no trace of them left.
The prisoners, according to the governor, Mr Frank McCarthy, became agitated recently on hearing that plans were afoot to remove the old netting and replace it with a finer mesh which would not allow drugs to spill through.
Complaining that the new plan would deprive them of light in the prison yard during exercise, they staged a sit-in on Wednesday from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. and it took 60 prison officers in full riot gear to get more than 100 prisoners back to their cells.
In another effort to counteract the widespread availability of drugs in the prison, prisoners and visitors must speak through screens, another bone of contention.
The protest at the jail was peaceful and no one was injured during the standoff. Yesterday Mr McCarthy would not discuss what form of sanction would be imposed on the 116 prisoners who took part in the protest but the least they can expect, according to prison sources, is the removal of some privileges. The prison has 275 inmates.