Two prisoners have been remanded for sentence for their parts in the 1997 Mountjoy Jail siege in which prison officers were held hostage and threatened with strangulation and had blood-filled syringes held to their throats.
Eamonn Seery (34), of Coultry Road, Ballymun, Dublin, and Edward Ferncombe (27), of Hare lawn Drive, Clondalkin, Dublin, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to falsely imprisoning a prison officer in January 1997. Judge Dominic Lynch remanded them for sentence to February 2nd.
Seery is serving an eight-year sentence imposed in 1993 for grievous bodily harm and was due for release on August 27th.
Ferncombe is serving nine years for manslaughter.
The court heard that both were locked up and handcuffed in Portlaoise Prison. Ferncombe alleged to an Eastern Health Board psychiatrist, Dr Brian McCaffrey, that this was done on the instigation of the Prison Officers' Association, which had threatened to strike otherwise.
Judge Lynch was told five prison officers were held hostage for 52 hours by six prisoners when a planned peaceful rooftop protest went wrong. Det Insp Hubert Collins agreed with Mr Michael O'Higgins BL, defending, that Seery was the most stable and calm of the offending prisoners and did not assault or threaten to assault any of the officers. He also agreed with Mr Brendan Grogan SC that his client, Ferncombe, had been mentioned as next in line after Seery as the least violent prisoner.