PRISON OFFICERS at Mountjoy jail in Dublin staged a walkout yesterday over the transfer of an inmate from solitary confinement in Castlerea.
Leroy Dumbrell was moved to Mountjoy yesterday after winning a court challenge to his detention in solitary confinement in Castlerea Prison earlier this month.
Some 200 prison officers discussed the matter at a lunchtime union meeting within the prison.
They later went outside the prison grounds and refused to return to work when scheduled at 2pm.
They returned to work shortly before 6pm but will be balloted for industrial action, up to and including strike action, over the next seven to 10 days.
The Prison Officers’ Association said the issue was not the arrival of a disruptive prisoner but the change of regimes in the separation unit.
This took place without discussion with staff or consideration of the manpower issue, the association said.
Dumbrell is serving an eight-year jail term for assault and had been transferred from Mountjoy to solitary confinement in Castlerea Prison last December. It was alleged he had been involved in riots at Mountjoy.
“On completion of this period of punishment, the prisoner remained in Castlerea Prison in the challenging behaviour unit for his own protection,” the prison service said in a statement, noting that the prisoner had no disciplinary incidents against him.
He took legal proceedings against the prison in August and the High Court ruled that he had been held in unlawful solitary confinement at Castlerea Prison for more than five months.
“On foot of this, a decision was taken to transfer the prisoner, as a protection prisoner, to the separation unit in Mountjoy,” the prison service said.
The separation unit, for the protection of prisoners, has minimum staffing due to the recruitment embargo, the association said.
Placing a “disruptive prisoner” in the area made the regime in the unit “null and void” and was “completely alien to the agreement” with officers, according to the association.
Association officers had asked prison service officials in the morning that the prisoner be placed under a restricted regime, the prison service said.
The officers were told that the regime and location of the prisoner was an “operational matter” for the governor and that the prison service was confident that the governor would take all necessary security and operational needs into account in coming to a decision in relation the issue.
The association also held discussions with the governor.
The prison service condemned the “wildcat industrial action, which is in total contravention of all industrial relations practices and procedures”.
During the dispute prisoners remained in lock-down and all visits were rescheduled. At no time was the prison unmanned and a skeleton staff remained in the prison, the association said.
The prisoner last night remained in the separation unit as planned, according to the prison service.
The matter was raised by the association’s officers with prison service officials yesterday morning. They requested that the prisoner be placed under a very restricted regime.
Dumbrell was jailed in 2006 for assaulting Nigel Reid who was out walking his dog when attacked. Mr Reid lost the sight of his left eye in the assault.
Dumbrell had more than 50 previous convictions and was on bail for another assault when he attacked Mr Reid in 2004.
