Sniffer dogs nose out smuggled prison drugs

Attempts to smuggle drugs into prisons have fallen dramatically thanks to sniffer dogs.

Figures from the Irish Prison Service show that fewer than 100 visitors to jails have been caught trying to smuggle drugs since the start of last year.

However, the scale of people detected by sniffer dogs as having been in contact with drugs, but not having any drugs in their possession, is far larger.

Last year, sniffer dogs detected visitors had been in contact with drugs on 4,624 occasions. However, to the end of September this year sniffer dogs had detected contact with drugs on 1,405 occasions.

Typically up to five people will be in a queue for prison visits. Sniffer dogs walk the line and sit down when they detect someone who has been in recent contact with drugs.

The person is then asked if they are carrying any illegal substances and may then be the subject of a pat-down search and offered a screened visit only. The figures show the greatest number of detections involves Mountjoy: 1,579 in 2011 but only 346 in the first nine months of this year.

There were more than 900 detections — referred to as “canine indications” — at the Midlands Prison this year, with 755 in Wheatfield and 772 in Limerick Prison.

St Patrick’s Institute for Young Offenders, the subject of a number of recent critical reports, had just 22 detections last year and six to the end of September this year.

All have experienced a considerable fall in such detections in the first nine months of this year, but in Cork Prison the number of detections in the first nine months of 2012 is more than double that for 2011 — 100 versus 48.

The Irish Prison Service said the rise was possibly due to overcrowding at Cork. Reductions in the overall number of inmates at the jail seems to have had a knock-on effect on detections of drug use among visitors.

In June there were 23 detections but over the three months from July to September just two other detections were made.

Chch men's prison has a sniffer dog trained to sniff out cell phones in case prisoners smuggle them in.

— Crystal Whitmore (@lacristal) November 27, 2012