Mountjoy Prison
The Mountjoy Prison (Irish: Príosún Mhuinseo ) is the main prison for the Irish capital Dublin and the surrounding counties and the largest prison in the Republic of Ireland .
The Mountjoy Prison, or The Joy for short , is located near the center in north Dublin. It is a closed, medium-security prison for male prisoners aged 17 and over. The "operational capacity" was officially stated in January 2009 as 540 prisoners, while in September 2010 there was talk of "630 male adults".
The prison was designed by Joshua Jebb (1793–1863) and opened in 1850 as Mountjoy Gaol . Like Kilmainham Gaol, it played a role in the Irish War of Independence (1919–1921) and the Irish Civil War (1922/1923), when fighters for the Irish independence movement were imprisoned here and a number of them died or were executed. The execution of Kevin Barry (1902–1920) in Mountjoy Prison, the first of a Republican prisoner since the Easter Rising in 1916, sparked international attention and protests from the Vatican, among othersout. In 1942, the IRA activist and writer Brendan Behan was briefly imprisoned at Mountjoy .
In October 1973, three IRA prisoners made a spectacular escape from prison with the help of a helicopter.
Since 1999, the prison complex has also included a Dóchas Center for female prisoners.
At the beginning of the 21st century, the conditions in Mountjoy Prison are characterized by overcrowding and extremely poor structural and sanitary conditions. It is planned to replace the prison with a replacement building for 1200 prisoners in the northern outskirts of Dublin.
In June 2009 it became known that due to extreme overcrowding with up to 670 (instead of 540) prisoners, some prisoners are now being housed in showers . One night in the summer of 2010, 129 prisoners had no beds, and some had no mattresses.
On May 12, 2010 the long-time director of the prison, John Lonergan, surprisingly announced his resignation on June 5, 2010.
literature
- Timothy Carey: Mountjoy. The Story of a Prison , The Collins Press, Cork 2000, ISBN 1898256896
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Mountjoy in Irish Prison Service ( Memento from April 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ The Irish Times : Inquiries follow suicide of woman in Mountjoy , August 19, 2010 (Eng.)
- ↑ The Irish Times: Mountjoy inmates being forced to sleep in showers , June 6, 2009
- ^ The Irish Times: Conditions in prisons 'inhumane' , November 29, 2010
- ^ The Irish Times: Mountjoy governor to retire in June , May 12, 2010
Coordinates: 53 ° 21 ′ 42 " N , 6 ° 16 ′ 2" W