McDowell to blame for jail conditions

THE necessity to establish an independent inquiry into the death of a prisoner in Mountjoy Prison is indicative of the intolerable overcrowding conditions that have been allowed to flourish in recent years by the policy of the present Government, spearheaded by Justice Minister Michael McDowell.

It is, indeed, a tragedy for the family of Gary Douch, as the minister said, but the unfortunate fact remains that the three-year sentence he had been serving became a death sentence.

Neither was it an isolated incident of serious violence in Mountjoy. A few days before this tragic death, a Nigerian inmate, imprisoned for life for the death of his wife, was attacked by a gang and stabbed three times, which may cause him to lose an eye.