Irish prisons 'degrading and dangerous'

yrwhu8jxtni06a

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0210/prison.html

Europe's leading human rights organisation has found evidence of degrading, dangerous and hazardous conditions both for prisoners and staff in a large number of Ireland's prisons and psychiatric hospitals.
The Strasbourg-based Committee for the Prevention of Torture highlighted a range of problems relating to violence and drug use, as well as a lack of training for personnel.
The Council of Europe, a 47-country organisation promoting democracy and human rights, oversees the committee.
In January and Febuary last year, the committee sent a nine-person delegation to investigate conditions at eight garda stations, six prisons and four hospitals relating to mental health or disabilities.
The delegation found a range of serious problems from overcrowding to drug misuse to gang-related violence within prisons.
The report speaks of Mountjoy Prison having a drug-fuelled gang culture where stabbings, slashings and assaults happen on an almost daily basis.
Conditions in Cork Prison were described as degrading and a health hazard, while the committee urged an end to the continued practice of slopping out at Portlaoise Prison.
The delegation also expressed deep concern at the use of special observation cells, especially due to temperatures and the clothing prisoners were given to wear.
Concern too was expressed at the level of violence between patients and towards staff at both St Brendan's and St Ita's psychiatric hospitals.
The Government has already provided a detailed response to the report and its various recommendations.
It referred to a dramatic increase in the prison population from over 3,000 at the time of the last committee visit in 2006 to over 5,000 prisoners now.
The Irish Penal Reform Trust said candidates in the election should 'take heed of this national disgrace and commit to rectifying the many human rights issues identified in the report'.
The Irish Council for Civil Liberties has called for the incoming Government to act swiftly to implement the report's recommendations.

Jesus it must be awful working in these places,even visiting a loved one locked up there must be frighting,of course the bankers,developers/corrupt politicians don't get locked up :mad:

Naikon

Not surprising imo.

Hande hoche!

At least they have their smuggled in mobile phones.

martic

Fcuk them, out breaking rocks with picks the scum should be not getting "rehabilitated" with state funds provided by decent law abiding citizens.

Hande hoche!

martic wrote: »

Fcuk them, out breaking rocks with picks the scum should be not getting "rehabilitated" with state funds provided by decent law abiding citizens.

Ideally in the hot sun.

biko

More prison gangs = more violence.
Divide and conquer.

aDeener

once they aren't a hazard to the decent people working there, i really couldn't give a shite tbh

iregk

Have to say and it may sound harsh. Once you go outside of the law and become a ciminal you give up your human rights as far as I'm concerned. Fcuk them!

phasers

If you want rights then don't get put in prison.

ejmaztec

If they were that bad, then no-one would be stupid enough to commit a crime would they?

mike65

ejmaztec wrote: »

If they were that bad, then no-one would be stupid enough to commit a crime would they?

/raised eyebrow

The prison population has risen to about 5000, when I was a lad it was about 2000, so is Ireland x 2.5 more criminal or are judges x 2.5 more likely to send you to jail?

Fremen

phasers wrote: »

If you want rights then don't get put in prison.

Yeah, fúck it. Steal a car, sign away your human rights.

RichieC

Christ, this place is full of fascists..

Fremen

Fremen wrote: »

Yeah, fúck it. Steal a car, sign away your human rights.

That's right.
Unpaid fines because you're broke? - sign away your human rights
Be in the wrong place at wrong time and/or falsely accused of something? - sign away your human rights

I'm glad everyone has such faith in our justice system while at the same time having no faith in the potential of rehabilitation, it's so inspiring

ScumLord

I heard they're full of criminals too.

martic wrote: »

Fcuk them, out breaking rocks with picks the scum should be not getting "rehabilitated" with state funds provided by decent law abiding citizens.

So you want to take criminals and put them on a rigorous fitness program in conditions that will inspire them to hate society more? Maybe we should let them keep the pickaxe when they're leaving too?

Fremen

ejmaztec wrote: »

If they were that bad, then no-one would be stupid enough to commit a crime would they?

That's impressively naive. Countries with much worse prison systems than ours still have high crime rates. Even countries with the death penalty have high crime rates.

Deterrents against crime are only part of the solution. If you make the punishment twice as bad, you don't cut crime in half.

ejmaztec

Fremen wrote: »

That's impressively naive.

Thanks, I'm glad you're impressed.

Fremen

bluewolf wrote: »

That's right.
Unpaid fines because you're broke? - sign away your human rights
Be in the wrong place at wrong time and/or falsely accused of something? - sign away your human rights

I'm glad everyone has such faith in our justice system while at the same time having no faith in the potential of rehabilitation, it's so inspiring

You know I was being ironic, right? :pac:

It's a bit sad that my earlier post could pass as a genuine response from a typical boardsie.

Cantona's Collars

Serious crime deserves serious time,what I don't agree with is people who can't/don't pay tv license fees end up in jail while absolute scum walk the streets.
Some of the scumbags down my way see doing time as a badge of honour and not something to be feared-we need that Sheriff from Texas over to sort them out.

ejmaztec

mike65 wrote: »

/raised eyebrow

The prison population has risen to about 5000, when I was a lad it was about 2000, so is Ireland x 2.5 more criminal or are judges x 2.5 more likely to send you to jail?

That was probably when crime was just a hobby for a select few, instead of a national pastime.:D

jackiebaron

martic wrote: »

Fcuk them, out breaking rocks with picks the scum should be not getting "rehabilitated" with state funds provided by decent law abiding citizens.

Wow! Wish I was as hard as you.

Nodin

zerks wrote: »

Serious crime deserves serious time,what I don't agree with is people who can't/don't pay tv license fees end up in jail while absolute scum walk the streets.
Some of the scumbags down my way see doing time as a badge of honour and not something to be feared-we need that Sheriff from Texas over to sort them out.

Nobody was advocating shorter sentences.

"that sherrif" is from Arizona and he runs the county jails. These hold lesser offenders, a great number of them in there for non-payment of bills and fines.

Nodin

ejmaztec wrote: »

That was probably when crime was just a hobby for a select few, instead of a national pastime.:D

No, it was probably during times of high emmigration, when we sent our saints and scholars abroad....

Ficheall

I dislike the way they seem to have lumped 'psychiatric hospitals' and 'prisons' together as though people therein deserved the same treatment.

The old "If you can't do the time, don't do the crime." idea doesn't have much weight if this "time" isn't really all that unpleasant...

JJJJNR

There are a lot more people getting put away for not paying fines these days, I think this is a joke, the system needs to be changed. If you were to take this population out of prisons I'm sure this situation would improve.

The prisons are also full with people who are mentally ill, yet the system judges everyone the same.

Its wrong that the biggest criminals of all will never set foot in places like this.

ejmaztec

Fremen wrote: »

That's impressively naive. Countries with much worse prison systems than ours still have high crime rates. Even countries with the death penalty have high crime rates.

Deterrents against crime are only part of the solution. If you make the punishment twice as bad, you don't cut crime in half.

I knew that some people would get upset if I missed out > .

Fremen

zerks wrote: »

Serious crime deserves serious time

The thing is - who decides what serious crime is? We can probably agree that murder, battery and sexual assault are serious crimes.

As far as I can tell, this is a breakdown of the number of people sent to prison in 2006. About 5% of the prison population were sentenced for the crimes I mentioned. The rest are there for damage to property, road traffic offences and drug offences.

zerks wrote: »

we need that Sheriff from Texas over to sort them out.

Walker, Texas ranger?

Nodin

Chuck is 70 or so now. I doubt the damp would do him any good.....

celticbest

If you obey the law of the land then you need not worry what condition prisons are in, although at this stage everyone knows the state our prisons are in so if you don't want to end up in one as the old saying goes

"Don't do the Crime if you can't do the Crime"

Fremen

celticbest wrote: »

If you obey the law of the land then you need not worry what condition prisons are in, although at this stage everyone knows the state our prisons are in so if you don't want to end up in one as the old saying goes

"Don't do the Crime if you can't do the Crime"

Taking your argument to its logical extreme, we might as well harvest the organs of criminals and donate them to ordinary, decent folk. Hey, if you don't want your organs harvested, don't do the crime.

cursai

Theres more important problems with our institutions than the ones we set up to facilitate the people who cause a lot of the problems in the first place!
Put them on the low priority list!

Nodin

celticbest wrote: »

If you obey the law of the land then you need not worry what condition prisons are in, although at this stage everyone knows the state our prisons are in so if you don't want to end up in one as the old saying goes

"Don't do the Crime if you can't do the Crime"

And what about 'punishment proportionate to the crime'....

Fremen

celticbest wrote: »

"Don't do the Crime if you can't do the Crime"

Yeah, I think people should be able to manage that one.

um7y1h83ge06nx

I better not comment as I was recently advocating the re-opening of Spike Island as a prison and using the Defence Forces as wardens/security.

It was a discussion on alleviating overcrowding in prisons and I supported this method as a low-cost, quick solution.

martic

jackiebaron wrote: »

Wow! Wish I was as hard as you.

You never will be because I'm as hard as fcuk.
All the comments about unpaid fines and wrongfully convicted, do me a favour and supply some statistics and to be honest I know if I had a fine for committing a crime I think I would pay it on time than face the risk of loosing my liberty.I worked in a prison for a while and seen the conditions these prisoners have to put up with and the only thing that they are less better off than the law abiding citizen is that they don't have their freedom. I will pull out of this thread now as its something that bugs the ****e out of me when it comes up with all the usual ohhh the poor convicts they shouldn't be treated so bad. They should be treated as bad as their crime was,half the reason why theres so much scum running around the place now robbing shooting and what ever else that will get a break in the holiday home for if they are caught.

Nodin

martic wrote: »

You never will be because I'm as hard as fcuk.
All the comments about unpaid fines and wrongfully convicted, do me a favour and supply some statistics and to be honest I know if I had a fine for committing a crime I think I would pay it on time than face the risk of using my liberty.I worked in a prison for a while and seen the conditions these prisoners have to put up with and the only thing that they are less better off than the law abiding citizen is that they don't have their freedom. .

Thats odd. I don't share a single room with 3 others and have to crap in a bucket.......or occassionally have to share with a fucking looper who should be in Dundrum....

martic wrote: »

They should be treated as bad as their crime was,.

....but they all get rammed into the same place together, petty criminals, stupid young fellahs, headers, gangsters, junkies.

fremen

fremen wrote:

You know I was being ironic, right?

Oh yes, I was just adding to it. Some of the other responses were pretty shocking

Wild_Dogger

f you want a crime free society , then you got to adapt a method from a country with no crime .
there are a few , and they work

I stayed In a sihthole region in singapore , far from the wealthy tourists , around poor poor people , it looked rough as , but still felt safe walking down side laneways in the dark at 2 in the morning. Even though you knew there were gangs of lads hanging around .....

They dont commit crime , nobody . the punishment makes it unworthy.
Society is safe but restricted , it works .

Isle of man anyone ?

jackiebaron

phasers wrote: »

If you want rights then don't get put in prison.

It seems to have escaped your attention that you do not relinquish certain rights after you have been issued a custodial sentence and if you think that you should then there are people who would like to give you a pretty compelling argument, namely the UN.

Fremen

martic wrote: »

do me a favour and supply some statistics

.

jackiebaron

celticbest wrote: »

If you obey the law of the land then you need not worry what condition prisons are in, although at this stage everyone knows the state our prisons are in so if you don't want to end up in one as the old saying goes

"Don't do the Crime if you can't do the Crime"

So you would have no problem in them just being randomly tortured and murdered too right? You would have no problem with them being treated like prisoners in Dachau or Gauntanamo or Abu Ghraib, right?

Fremen

martic wrote: »

You never will be because I'm as hard as fcuk.

Hard man, eh? Been in a few fights, I'd say. You know, you can do time for that if things don't go your way.

jackiebaron

Wild_Dogger wrote: »

f you want a crime free society , then you got to adapt a method from a country with no crime .
there are a few , and they work

I stayed In a sihthole region in singapore , far from the wealthy tourists , around poor poor people , it looked rough as , but still felt safe walking down side laneways in the dark at 2 in the morning. Even though you knew there were gangs of lads hanging around .....

They dont commit crime , nobody . the punishment makes it unworthy.
Society is safe but restricted , it works .

Isle of man anyone ?

Yeah right! And the Death sentence and life without parole for stealing a pizza have really solved America's crime problem. You wanna live in a police state with draconian laws and medieval prison conditions then go right ahead. There are plenty of sh1tholes around the world where you can settle.

Wile E. Coyote

Maya Wide Sinner wrote: »

I better not comment as I was recently advocating the re-opening of Spike Island as a prison and using the Defence Forces as wardens/security.

It was a discussion on alleviating overcrowding in prisons and I supported this method as a low-cost, quick solution.

Thats not a bad idea. The facility is there. I'm sure it would cost a lot less building a new prison and would take a lot of the over crowding from other prisons.

People are in prison because thats where they deserve to be. If you don't like the conditions then tough sh*t. And before someone starts crying out about the wrongly convicted, or the people who didn't pay their tv licence, show me some figures to prove how many are in there.

Wile E. Coyote

Wile E. Coyote wrote: »

And before someone starts crying out about the wrongly convicted, or the people who didn't pay their tv licence, show me some figures to prove how many are in there.

Any number above 0 is too many. It doesn't matter how frequently it happens beyond that.

jackiebaron

martic wrote: »

You never will be because I'm as hard as fcuk.
All the comments about unpaid fines and wrongfully convicted, do me a favour and supply some statistics and to be honest I know if I had a fine for committing a crime I think I would pay it on time than face the risk of loosing my liberty.I worked in a prison for a while and seen the conditions these prisoners have to put up with and the only thing that they are less better off than the law abiding citizen is that they don't have their freedom. I will pull out of this thread now as its something that bugs the ****e out of me when it comes up with all the usual ohhh the poor convicts they shouldn't be treated so bad. They should be treated as bad as their crime was,half the reason why theres so much scum running around the place now robbing shooting and what ever else that will get a break in the holiday home for if they are caught.

Yeah, have your rant and then slink away like a fart in the wind...the .net equivalent of ramming your fingers in your ears and shouting "I can't hear you".
Hard as fcuk? Hard as baby-sh1t more like. Where was this Shangri-La prison where you worked where inmates have their own private apartments, girlfriends/boyfriends, all-mod cons, alcohol, etc?

Rawhead

Its a no win situation and here is why.

1. Make prisons clean, modern, healthy environments that rehabilitate prisoners and one group will say "fu*king hotels, they have it too easy, they should be breaking rocks"

2. Make them rock hard warehouses that lock them up 23 hours a day and the other group will say "the poor prisoners, its far to harsh, what about their rights"

My view is that with the current state of the economy there is far better ways to spend money than on convicted criminals.

tallaghtmick

in before everyone else with..............but what about the policticians who robbed us all shouldnt they be locked up:rolleyes::P:pac:

aDeener

RichieC wrote: »

Christ, this place is full of fascists..

you say that as if that's a bad thing?.......

Naikon

bluewolf wrote: »

That's right.
Unpaid fines because you're broke? - sign away your human rights
Be in the wrong place at wrong time and/or falsely accused of something? - sign away your human rights

I'm glad everyone has such faith in our justice system while at the same time having no faith in the potential of rehabilitation, it's so inspiring

You do know that there is no system in this country for spent convictions? Once you are convicted of any crime, from stealing something out of a shop, to international fraud, you are ****ed. Even with spent convictions, the records remain I hear, it's just you can legally say "no" to questions about a criminal past. Emigration would still know about it.

Justice is more of a game than about fairness. There are too many people in the world, so essentially, the justice system acts as a means to self eradicate people through suicide. For instance when you can't get a job due to a criminal history and multiple degrees, it does not exactly fill somebody with much confidence.

Don't get convicted of anything. Even shoplifting can potentially damage your reputation. It's not right, but it's how the system works. The real punishment is everlasting. Could the justice system prove to be a great tool for reducing the world population? I believe so. When you can't get a job or live in a stable manner, suicide looks far more promising.

Rehabilitation within the context of the justice system is a myth imo. Not right at all.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/08/us-suicide-law-idUSTRE71769920110208

slimjimmc

bluewolf wrote: »

That's right.
Unpaid fines because you're broke? - sign away your human rights
Be in the wrong place at wrong time and/or falsely accused of something? - sign away your human rights

I'm glad everyone has such faith in our justice system while at the same time having no faith in the potential of rehabilitation, it's so inspiring

I'm pretty sure those who were imprisoned for non-payment of a court fine were committed for refusing to pay, not for a genuine inability to pay.

Prisons shouldn't be luxurious like some seem to be but neither should they be a place where you're in fear of your life.