Prisons

Ireland's prisons are full, according to new figures showing the total number of people in prison in the State now exceeds the number of beds available. The number of prisoners across the State yesterday reached 4,416, five more than the total 4,411 beds across all prisons. One prison — Limeri

Irish law must be urgently changed to ensure that defendants who turn 18 while awaiting trial continue to be dealt with through the child justice system, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) has been told. Molly Joyce, acting executive director of the Irish Penal Reform Trust (IPRT),

Northern Ireland's bail regime is out-of-step with neighbouring jurisdictions, leading to more people being held on remand and for longer, according to a new report from the criminal justice watchdog. Following the report's publication this morning, the chief inspector of criminal justice in No

Northern Ireland's High Court has granted leave for a prisoner's judicial review of restrictions likened to solitary confinement imposed on inmates returning from compassionate temporary release. The legal action — brought by prisoner Curtis Tanner, represented by solicitor Owen Beattie &mdash

Weekly prison visits have been reinstated from today for the first time since the start of the pandemic. Physical visits were suspended in March 2020 after the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. They were partly reinstated in May 2022, but limited to one physical visit every two weeks.

Northern Ireland’s High Court has refused an application for judicial review where it found that the applicant’s probation release had been delayed by factors such as the Covid-19 pandemic and his own failed drug tests. In considering this application, the court found that one of the rel

Government proposals to reform the inspection of prisons will not allow Ireland to ratify the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention against Torture (OPCAT), the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission has said. The rights body will become the co-ordinating national preventative mechanism (NPM) u

In its new report published today on its visit to Bulgaria in October 2021, the Council of Europe’s committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) hails rare occurrences of ill-treatment by staff, reduction of prison population and certain improvements in living conditions. However, it regrets

Continued delays to the introduction of a new prisoner complaints system is of "critical concern", according to a new report. The latest annual report from the prisons inspectorate notes that no progress was made on a new prisoner complaints system in 2021 despite five years of warnings that the exi

A rise in prisoner numbers suggests the penal system is returning to "business as usual" after the pandemic, experts have warned. The Irish Prison Service (IPS) yesterday published its annual report for 2021 as justice minister Helen McEntee visited Limerick Prison to review its major expansion proj

The European Court of Human Rights has dismissed a discrimination claim brought by an Irish man who was disqualified from receiving a State pension while he served a prison sentence in the State. The claim was based on Article 14 of the European Convention of Human Rights and concerned the operation

The Irish Prison Service (IPS) has been ordered to pay €55,000 to a senior official with a heart condition who was denied the right to work from home during the Covid-19 pandemic. The complainant instructed solicitors in June 2020 to lodge two complaints with the Workplace Relations Commission

The Irish Prison Service (IPS) will be placed on a full statutory footing with a non-executive board and other structures aligning with best practice under new government plans. The IPS is currently a non-statutory agency of the Department of Justice. It has approximately 3,500 staff and an annual b

Individuals released in 2019 from custodial sentences lasting between three and six months had the highest likelihood of re-offending within a year, new statistics show. Justice Minister Helen McEntee has welcomed the latest publication by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) of a statistical release

Human rights lawyer Mark Kelly has been appointed as Ireland's new inspector of prisons. Mr Kelly will replace Mark Toland, who has been fulfilling the role on an interim basis since the dramatic resignation of Patricia Gilheaney in February.