Reports by visiting committees highlight prison overcrowding

DEGRADING TREATMENT of prisoners, alleged assaults by prison officers and other prisoners, pressure from prisoners to use drugs and severe overcrowding are among the issues raised by the Mountjoy Prison Visiting Committee in its 2008 report.

The report is one of 14 prison visiting committee reports published by the Department of Justice yesterday evening.

Each prison in the State has a visiting committee appointed. Their role is to supervise the treatment of prisoners. They hear complaints from prisoners and reports to the Minister on any abuses.

Mountjoy prison is “not suitable for detaining prisoners”, says the committee.

“The stated core value of the Irish Prison Service, that it is committed to making available to each person in custody the conditions and services that are appropriate to their well-being and personal development, falls far short of reality.”

Overcrowding at the prison, it said, remains a major problem.

The report details how the committees saw up to 11 prisoners being held in a basement cell while waiting to have their cases heard by the governor. “It is a degrading spectacle. Prisoners’ cases would probably be better heard on an individual basis, in an office or on their respective wings,” says the report.

There are still “far too many drugs” at Mountjoy “and still too much pressure on some prisoners to partake in drug supply and use”.

The Cork prison visiting committee report describes “a constant and unacceptable overcrowding problem” which is “not conducive to active rehabilitation”.

The committee welcomes proposals for a new facility in north Cork and “hope these plans can be brought to fruition as soon as possible”.

In the Limerick prison report concerns are raised about the 12-bed capacity in the female wing being exceeded.

At Castlerea the committee “was very concerned at the overcrowding”. While the cell capacity is for 214 prisoners there were up to 262 prisoners at one point in 2008.

The remand wing, which has a capacity of 20, had a population high of 62 at one point.