Minister for Justice Michael McDowell was warned almost two years ago by the State's human rights watchdog about the dangers of accommodating psychiatric prisoners in Mountjoy Prison, it has emerged.
In a submission to the Minister in November 2004, the Irish Human Rights Commission (IHRC) expressed concern at the findings of the European Committee on the Prevention of Torture (CPT) during an inspection of the prison.
It expressed alarm at the inappropriate placement of mentally ill prisoners in Mountjoy and Cork prisons, called for proper health services for such inmates and urged that all psychiatric prisoners be transferred to the Central Mental Hospital.
Details of this report come a week after the death of prisoner Gary Douch in Mountjoy Prison. The chief suspect had spent a short time in the Central Mental Hospital in the two weeks before being transferred to Mountjoy.
When contacted by The Irish Times yesterday, the president of the IHRC, Dr Maurice Manning, confirmed that the report had been sent to the Department of Justice and the Minister almost two years ago.
"Had these warnings been heeded, the terrible events of last week might have been averted," he said.
"We saw the CPT report as highlighting some of the glaring deficiencies in the prison system. We were very concerned at that stage that priority be given to tackling these deficiencies. At this stage, what's done is done. It's imperative that both the CPT report's findings and those of Mr Michael Mellett [who is heading an independent inquiry into the killing] be implemented with urgency as well."
The CPT was established by the Council of Europe in the late 1980s to help protect the human rights of people in detention. It operates by means of periodic visits to places of detention at four-yearly intervals.
The committee is due to visit Ireland later this year and is likely to visit Mountjoy Prison.
A spokesman for Mr McDowell yesterday said progress had been made on many of the recommendations put forward by the CPT in its last report.
He said although some of the recommendations raised were matters for the Department of Health and the Irish Prison Service, progress had been made in reducing the use of padded cells for psychiatric prisoners.
An amendment to the Criminal Law (Insanity) Act, which had ended the use of prisons as "designated centres" to detain mentally ill people, had also dealt with one of the CPT's chief concerns, the spokesman added.
Other recommendations made by the CPT included the appointment of a full-time medical director at Mountjoy Prison to co-ordinate a full-time medical service, including a qualified psychiatrist.