Crime by offenders on bail rises 20% as prison overcrowding hits crisis levels

Cork Prison has experienced one of the worst increases in overcrowding during 2025, and is now 132% over capacity. Picture: Dan Linehan

Recorded crimes committed by people already on bail for other offences has jumped by 20% in the last two years.

Cork City and Dublin’s north inner city show the sharpest rises in urban areas, with a large number of county divisions also experiencing significant increases.

Senior sources said the increases were part of a wider "crisis in the criminal justice system", reflected by a severe, and worsening, overcrowding crisis in the country’s jails.

The latest figures show new records were set on Wednesday, with prison numbers hitting 5,581, more than 900 more that can be accommodated in Irish jails.

Consequently, prison overcrowding reached a new high of 120% overcapacity.

Cork Prison has experienced one of the worst increases in overcrowding during 2025, and is now 132% over capacity.

Prison sources are most concerned about potential violence and security issues at older prisons with small cells, like Mountjoy Prison, and Cloverhill Remand Prison, which has larger cells but with up to four inmates in them. 

Cloverhill also has a high number of inmates, including homeless people, with serious or severe mental health issues.

“Gardai are doing their job, arresting and prosecuting offenders and the courts — and there have been a large number of extra judges appointed — are doing their job by convicting them or remanding them to prison, but the prisons are overflowing and have no space to hold them,” a senior justice source said.

That means those sent to prison are either processed, placed in a holding cell for an hour or whatever, and then released back out. Or, if they have to be held — say it’s a serious charge or conviction — other prisoners have to be released, on temporary release.

The source added: “We have reached the stage, and have for a while, where there is a crisis in the criminal justice system.” 

Prison sources have previously said use of temporary release has already passed its maximum safe usage, with numbers topping 600 on Thursday.

In a case reported in the Irish Examiner on Thursday, a man who spat phlegm in a garda’s face in Cork was jailed for five months, but was turned away from prison.

The man was jailed for five months at Midleton District Court. However, due to overcrowding in Cork prison, he was back out.

A second justice source said judges and gardaí knew prisons were full when bail was being considered.

The source said: “But if it’s a repeat shoplifter or a homeless guy or an addict constantly causing trouble, what are they going to do on bail? They will continue.” 

Official figures on the number of crime incidents, where at least one of the suspected offenders was on bail at the time, reveals:

• 42,603 incidents in 2024, compared to 39,250 in 2023 and 35,478 in 2022 — an increase of 20% in two years;
• 2,211 incidents in Cork City in 2024, up 31% on 2022 (1,691);
• 9,718 incidents in Dublin North Central in 2024, up 31% on 2022 (7,397);
• Meath/Westmeath division saw a 72% increase, from 1,121 to 1,927;
• Kerry reported a 34% rise, from 565 to 755;
• Louth/Cavan/Monaghan had a 24% increase, from 1,686 to 2,092. 

All but two divisions experienced a rise in incidents in the last two years.