No Prison Space

Quitelife

Met an old schoolmate yesterday who works as a courtclerk , gave him a rub about leniancey of courts etc .

He goes onto tell me Judges are more or less told to send as few people as possible to jail as there is no capacity , the only crimes that will guarantee you jail are murdering someone, with a lot less for manslaughter, Sexual offenders & Republicans After that only if your a top top end Drug dealer or multiple convicted Burgular will you be likely to get a prison sentence .

Is it any wonder there is so much criminality going unpunished in Ireland leading to so much misery all over the place with mid to low level criminals laughing at the law abiding.

kirk.

We could repurpose the Argos stores at a pinch

Bullocks

It's a joke, we badly need a couple of big prisons built.

I don't know why more people aren't looking for them.

Scummers and repeat offenders know only too well that they won't get much time for this very reason, it's the reason for criminals are so blatant these days and the guards must be loosing the will to bother arresting them when they know they can't be imprisoned anyhow.

If the state can't fund them maybe we should be looking at privately built prisons

tayto lover

Release Barabbas.

SEPT 23 1989

big prisons + long sentences = very bad for the legal profession

just keep them rolling in day after day building up those convictions and bill the state by the hour

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202093#Comment_121202093

Yeah, just look at how bad the US legal profession is doing.

Seriously, do you think at all above the superficial before making ridiculous statements like this?

SEPT 23 1989

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202120#Comment_121202120

the prison system is big business over there has been since the 90's

plenty of money to be made putting men behind bars long term

downtheroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121200434#Comment_121200434

Why build more? Just throw the scum in on top of each other.

BlueSkyDreams

When was the last prison built does anyone know?

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202298#Comment_121202298

It is indeed. Huge business for the prison system and the legal profession in the States.

Which shows that your claim that the Irish legal profession is somehow conspiring to prevent expansion of the prison system over here due their own financial ends is absolute nonsense.

downtheroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202784#Comment_121202784

You are the one talking absolute nonsense.

Plenty in the legal system are absolutely creaming it from legal aid payments.

https://www.irishlegal.com/articles/top-criminal-legal-aid-lawyers-earn-over-eur690000

Blarney_man

Build one on Cliffs of Moher, make holes all over the thing, just so the wind annoys them in between Premiership games that they watch at our expense

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202830#Comment_121202830

They are indeed, but they’d also be creaming in even more if we had more prisons and prisoners. The claim that was made here (and is often made here) that the legal profession are conspiring to prevent prisons being built is patent nonsense on every level.

downtheroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202963#Comment_121202963

But if Anto isn't in prison, and notches up 100+ convictions, with free legal aid each time, the solicitor/barrister does far better than if Anto gets incarcerated and can't make any more appearances in court?

nachouser

Screenshot 2023-10-06 202820.png

Current prison capacity.

Costs about 80k a year to keep someone in prison.

366m and change a year.

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202996#Comment_121202996

You seem to think that Anto will just head off to prison and that’s that. You’re failing to take into account that more imprisonment will result in more appeals, more claims for incidents in prison, more robust (and therefore more expensive) defence strategies. The legal defence of prisoners costs more overall that of non-prisoners.

And even if the legal profession were to lose out on money from increased imprisonment (which they most certainly won’t), where’s the evidence that it’s them that is preventing prisons from being no built. Do you really think it was a cabal of lawyers that scuppered Thornton Hall? Please…

seanrambo87

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202784#Comment_121202784

It's big business in America because they have privatised prisons. They benefit from slave labour and a government subsidy per client. It's in their interest to keep agreeable clients (non violent drug offenders etc..) in as long as possible. It is not in our interest to go down that route. We are our own people we should deal with problems our own way. Not try to emulate a different culture. Build more prisons and back our Gardai. Simple. I've no problems with a Gard dishing out common sense a la lugs brannigan. Reinstate reasonable chastisement of our children.god knows there's a lot who need the fear of authority slapped into them. There's a quote I like, hard times make hard men, hard men make times good, good times make soft men, soft men make hard times. I think we're over run with soft men.

Fighting Irish? Ha, don't make me laugh

Tefral

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202362#Comment_121202362

I was involved in the recent Limerick Prison upgrade, Grim place, Especially the Womens wing. they pretty much doubled the capacity of Limerick Prison in the last year and a half.

I was involved in the Original Works to Thornton Hall but that was canned.

twowheelsonly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202362#Comment_121202362

New Cork Prison in 2016 but that was only to replace the old one and capacity wise isn't much bigger.

New wing for the females in Limerick in the last year. Added roughly 30 female beds.

Cloverhill, Dochas (Mountjoy Females) and Midlands were all completed and opened around 1999/2000

Pauliedragon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121202340#Comment_121202340

Issue with that is pile them all on to each other more violence happens so somebody get's the **** beaten out of them. Next the state/taxpayer gets sued and said criminal wins a fortune. My issue is why are judges giving soft sentences or suspended sentences beacause the prisons are too full? That shouldn't come into the equation. Sentence the person appropriately and let the prison system sort out the accommodation arrangements. Re open Spike Island they have plenty of room.

Strumms

last February is was reported there were 4,416 prisoners in custody with only a 4,411 bed capacity across the system, that was according to figures from the Irish Prison Service themselves…

We’ve about what 5.1 - 5.2 million people here and only 4,411 prison spaces ? the capacity of Dalymount Park currently is about ….4,300

Limericks female prison was 164% of capacity.

thats illustrating the absolute dearth of prison capacity… and it’s shows how little interest the political system and its inhabitants have for the irish citizens… state and citizens money which is and was magically appearing and will probably continue to appear for years to help the plight of the Ukrainian citizens and others but the very foundational needs of this country and Irish citizens just gets put on the back burner. What a great country, what a time to be alive.

billyhead

What about Spike Island if they invested in it?

InAtFullBack

There should be a mix of private and public prisons in Ireland as clearly the appetite in political circles is not there to address the capacity issue. It would be the perfect job opportunity for the failed bouncers/doormen of Ireland to actually excel in a career.

kirk.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121203582#Comment_121203582

Bouncers wouldn't do any better minding prisoners

For Forks Sake

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121203576#Comment_121203576

It's owned by Cork County the past twenty years and it's an award winning tourist attraction

Donald Trump

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121200442#Comment_121200442

Welease Wodger

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij0N7le-UpI

BlueSkyDreams

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121203488#Comment_121203488

5.3 million now.

1.5 million more people since 2000, or a 40% increase.

InAtFullBack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121203690#Comment_121203690

I wouldn't be losing much sleep over that - would you? Rather a convict at the end of a raw deal than some poor chap on a night out celebrating after a hard weeks work.

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121203582#Comment_121203582

Genuine question but how would the financial situation work ?

if it costs circa 80,000 just to keep a prisoner for a year….

privately they will need to bill the state around you’d imagine 110,000 - 120,000 a year per prisoner…. They have the same or similar costs but they need to make a profit on each inmate…

Get Real

Agree we could do with more prison space and would have no problem with the state funding building and running as they currently do. Imo privatisation of prisons is an absolute no go. The UK made a hames of it.

Firstly, the fact that a private company might be incentivised to cut corners on running the prison and rehabilitation.

Secondly, the staff are employed by g4s on 13 or 14 quid an hour. It's not really a career. There's no loyalty to the job or building a life around it. There's no pension. And the staff don't actually see themselves as prison officers. More "I'm staff here and the problems that are happening aren't actually my issue to fix"

Look at this in the UK: https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.sky.com/story/amp/a-prison-officer-will-get-killed-staff-warn-of-chaos-and-violence-inside-flagship-super-prison-12974748

Low wage, can apply like you would for a retail job, your mates in prison can encourage you to apply. Your real wage is working for the prison gangs and being paid by them. And if it gets a bit hot under the collar, resign and take another job paying similar money, the job you had before.

Varik

Our prisons were built when labour was cheap, a mass of cells in wings releasing them in largish communal areas where you need a large group of guards to manage.

New prisons should be built with cells split into very small groups with own communal area sealed off from rest. Smaller number of guards needed at peak. Have some cells fully separated to let prisoner choose to self isolate.