Retiring governor gives prisoners €50 gift

CRIME does pay after all. Prison inmates in one of the country's largest jails were yesterday celebrating an unlikely windfall after the governor gave them a €13,000 retirement gift.

The 260 inmates in Cork prison, who normally make do on a few euro a day, each pocketed €50.

Governor Frank McCarthy, who is to retire from the prison service in March after a long career in some of the State's toughest jails, decided to use surplus cash from his own discretionary account to pay for the present.