Cork Prison death: Inquest hears that monitoring tech would not have saved Jamie Crowley
Deirdre Crowley with a photo of her son Jamie outside Cork Courthouse during the inquest into his death which occurred in Cork Prison. The jury returned a verdict of misadventure. Picture: Noel Sweeney
A 27-year-old man found dead in his bed in Cork prison would not have been saved even if a new technology, soon to be piloted to monitor a prisoner’s vital signs in their cells, had already been introduced.
Jamie Crowley was being checked every 15 minutes by prison officers looking through the hatch in his cell door at the time of his death on March 14, 2024.
But this would be insufficient to tell if a person lying in bed at night was still breathing, Cork City Coroner’s Court heard.
Enda Kelly, who oversees nursing and primary care services in the Irish Prison Service (IPS), said that a new technology to monitor a prisoner’s vital signs is to be trialled soon in Limerick and Cloverhill prisons.
This is in its final stages of design before the pilot’s rollout. If successful, it will be introduced throughout Irish prisons.
The monitor will be a small device akin to a smoke alarm fitted in certain cells that will pick up on minute movements, which can alert prison staff if someone stops moving for a certain period of time.
But this technology is expensive and invasive, bringing potential concerns around human rights and privacy, so it would only be used in specific cells for very vulnerable prisoners, Mr Kelly said.
There are three of these cells in Cork Prison, and Mr Crowley would not have been deemed vulnerable enough to be in one before his death, the court heard.
Recent advances in AI have made the technology more reliable, prompting its pending introduction in Ireland, former Assistant Governor in Cork Prison, Bryan Clancy, said.
But the technology is not a panacea, Mr Kelly warned.
Mr Crowley had been hospitalised briefly that morning before his death when he was found with extremely low oxygen levels of only 20%, taking just four breaths per minute.
But by the time he reached hospital he had stabilised, and he was discharged back to Cork Prison that morning.
He was still alive around midnight on the night of March 13 or the morning of March 14, as a prison officer was called to give the two cellmates a 'scratcher' to light a cigarette.
But Mr Crowley collapsed in his bed, eyes rolling, before he finished rolling his cigarette, his cellmate, Richard O’Brien, said. Mr O’Brien said that he thought Mr Crowley had fallen asleep.
When he woke around 7am, he found his cellmate cold to the touch with no pulse.
He had been dead for some time as rigor mortis had set in in his hands and his blood had begun to pool in his torso.
Assistant State Pathologist Dr Margaret Bolster said that Mr Crowley’s cause of death was alcohol withdrawal seizures.
Alcohol is an extremely toxic substance that damages the brain, Dr Bolster said.
An analysis of Mr Crowley’s brain showed pinpoint bleeding or haemorrhaging consistent with seizures.
Alcohol damage is ongoing, even after a person has stopped consuming it, Dr Bolster said.
He had had multiple seizures in his life due to alcohol but had no formal diagnosis of epilepsy, she said.
These seizures would cause significant neurotransmitter damage in the brain.
Alcohol withdrawal can be deadly, with a high mortality rate of up to 12.5%.
Although it was suggested previously by Cork Prison GP Dr Conor McGarry that he suspected the deceased may have overdosed, as he had told two people that he was taking additional drugs to those he was prescribed, Dr Bolster said that no ‘drugs of abuse’ were found in his system.
No alcohol was found in his system either; only prescribed methadone, anti-seizure and tranquilliser medications were found in sub-therapeutic and therapeutic levels.
On a blood sample taken when he was admitted to Cork Prison on March 8, 2024, he tested positive for cocaine, cannabis, benzodiazepines and opiates.
A blood sample taken during his admission to Cork University Hospital on his last full day of life on March 13, 2024, found no illegal drugs, and a urine sample taken post-mortem found no trace of illegal drugs.
Dr Bolster said that these toxicology reports left her confident that ingesting ‘drugs of abuse’ did not cause his death.
Barrister for the family Tom Creed said that prison staff had done everything they were supposed to do when dealing with Mr Crowley, but he suggested that the systems in place were not enough to preserve his life.
He also asked if the new monitoring technology, due to be piloted in Limerick and Cloverhill prisons soon, would have been enough to save him.
Following a 45-minute deliberation, a jury of five women and three men returned a verdict of misadventure.
The jury made three recommendations.
- They recommended that a more appropriate system of monitoring/surveillance be implemented for people deemed vulnerable and, if the proposed monitoring system is deemed to be successful, that the scope be extended to monitor all vulnerable persons;
- A second recommendation is that clarity should be provided as to what a vulnerable person is and what should flow from that;
- They also recommended that in every situation where a person is discharged from hospital, a medical professional on duty should set out clearly the extent of the monitoring required.
Mr Crowley’s mother, Deirdre Crowley, said that her son was her “golden boy” and his death has had a devastating impact on all their lives, including on his two beautiful children.
Her son was a “beautiful soul” with a “unique personality and a life that mattered deeply.” He loved music and cooking and wanted to be a chef.
“I thought he would be safe and protected,” she said.
“Our world has changed... the emotional toll is constant. Not a second goes by that I don’t think of him."
She said she now suffers sleepless nights and has to look at “the empty chair at the table” in their home.
“A piece of our family is gone forever, and that space can never be filled.”
Coroner Philip Comyn extended his sympathy to the family.
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