Mentally ill prisoner found lying on floor of locked room

A MENTALLY ill prisoner who had lost control of bodily functions was found lying on the floor of a locked room in a prison, an Oireachtas committee has heard.

Inspector of Prisons Judge Michael Reilly told members of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality the issue of mentally ill patients was “a considerable problem”.

Addressing the sub-committee on penal reform, Judge Reilly said that mentally ill prisoners and prisoners returning to the community did not get a fair deal, particularly from the media.

Referring to the case of the mentally ill patient he had found lying on a floor in a locked room of a prison, he said he was not recounting the circumstances in order to be sensational.

“It is just what I found,” he said.

The individual concerned was not capable of looking after themself and had lost control of bodily functions.

He said the prison officers were disciplined and trained people, “but their training was different to the training of a nurse in a mental hospital” and because of the problems the prison officers faced, “and for the prisoner’s own safety, this was the distressing sight we were left with”.

Judge Reilly said it was his view that mentally ill people should not be in prison. He said part of the problem was that the Central Mental Hospital – the secure unit for mentally ill people deemed to be a danger to the community – had only about 100 beds.

He said he was awaiting the report of the commission of investigation into the death of Gary Douch in Mountjoy Prison, as he believed the investigation might cover relevant issues.

But he said if it did not, he would write his own report on issues surrounding the care of the mentally ill. Gary Douch died following an attack while he was a prisoner in Mountjoy Prison on August 1st, 2006.

On the rehabilitation of prisoners generally, the judge told the committee that “in some 26 years as a judge, and now as inspector, I have not come across anybody who has been improved by going to prison”.

The committee, which is examining the possible use of non-custodial alternatives to imprisonment was told by Paddy Richardson, chief executive of the Irish Association for the Social Integration of Offenders, there was a media image of prisoners as convicts “who go to the gym three times a week” while “taking a break” in prison.

Paul Mackay, chairman of the organisation Care After Prison said “people are there [in prison] as punishment, not for punishment.”

Earlier yesterday the committee was told prisoners serving sentences of between one and five years were likely to be allowed to trade part of their sentences for community service, after a successful pilot programme was introduced last year.

The initiative, which the Probation Service said was “unique internationally”, allows existing prisoners coming towards then end of their sentence to exchange remaining time for community work.

The pilot “Community Return” scheme was offered to selected prisoners last October, with some 70 being approved for temporary release-to-work schemes, such as painting and refurbishing hostels for the homeless, last October.

A second phase of the pilot programme is due to be completed in March.