42
Concerns in Europe: January - June 2001
AI Index: EUR 01/003/2001
Amnesty International September 2001
prevention, detection or investigation of offences or
the apprehension or prosecution of offenders in the
future. Their counsel also argued that if the application
for exemption was upheld, while evidence continued
to be heard from other witnesses, his clients would not
have an opportunity to respond to allegations against
them. The inquiry by the sub-committee was then
adjourned.
In May 36 police officers were also given leave
by the High Court for judicial review to challenge the
inquiry by the sub-committee, arguing that the sub-
committee was undertaking an inquiry into the
shooting incident, whereas its terms of reference
entitled it only to inquire into the police
commissioner’s report of the incident. They disputed
also the power of the sub-committee to compel the
attendance of witnesses and to direct the production of
documents. The police officers were also given
permission to apply on notice to the state for a stay on
the activities of the sub-committee, pending the
outcome of the judicial review challenge.
At the opening of the hearings of the sub-
committee, two police representative bodies joined the
family of John Carthy and civil liberties campaigners
in the call for an independent public judicial inquiry
as the only means of establishing the full facts to the
satisfaction of all parties involved.
John Morris
At the inquest into the death of John Morris, at the end
of June, the jury returned a finding, rather than a
verdict, that John Morris was fatally injured during a
shooting in 1997, and died the following day from a
single bullet wound to the head (he had also been shot
once in the lower abdomen) (see EUR 01/02/98 and
EUR 01/03/00).
Reportedly, the police officers who fired the shots
stated at the inquest that they were in the area where
the shooting took place on unrelated work, when they
saw a man acting suspiciously and holding something
under his jumper. They followed him into an estate
and saw two men wearing balaclavas, one carrying a
handgun and one carrying a knife. One of the police
officers stated that he opened fire when John Morris
came out of a fire door, turned and pointed the gun at
him. The police officer said that he had feared for his
life. Two other police officers said that they shot at
John Morris when they saw him pointing his gun at
their colleague.
The police officers gave evidence from behind
screens and were named by letters of the alphabet to
protect their identities, following alleged threats made
after the death of John Morris, who was a member of
a republican armed group, the Irish National
Liberation Army.
The family of John Morris and their counsel had
withdrawn from the proceedings some days earlier
claiming that important documents had not been
disclosed to them.
Prisons
AI was concerned about allegations that some aspects
of the treatment of persons who suffer from mental
illness and who are detained in Irish prisons may be
cruel, inhuman and degrading. The organization’s
concerns increased following the publication, in April,
of a report by the Irish Penal Reform Trust (IPRT),
entitled Report on the treatment of offenders who have
mental illness. The report, based on visits carried out
by IPRT experts to Mountjoy, Cork and Limerick
prisons between 20 February and 20 March 2001,
focuses on the imposition of solitary confinement in
isolation cells. Concerns emerging from the report are
threefold:
·
The decisions regarding the detention of
individuals in isolation cells do not appear to be
based on explicitly set criteria. As a result, the
purpose to be served by the imposition of solitary
confinement often seems unclear, which makes it
impossible to assess whether detention in solitary
confinement is needed in all the cases in which it
is imposed. The very high percentage of detention
in isolation cells of people mentally disturbed
indicates that the use of solitary confinement
appears
to
serve
as
a
substitute
for
medical/psychological care. This is especially
worrying because of the particular vulnerability
of the persons that were found to be more likely
to be detained in an isolation cell. The IPRT also
estimates that almost 40 percent of the prison
population in Ireland may be suffering from some
level of mental illness or disturbance.
·
The conditions in which prisoners are detained in
isolation cells - as reported by the IPRT - may
amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
For example, the report found that:
-
isolation cells are single cells furnished
only with a thin mattress on the ground and
a blanket. Some have padded walls to
protect the prisoner from self-harm;
-
some cells do
not have a call-button;
-
prisoners in isolation cells are locked up for
23 hours a day;
-
windows are always sealed; many of the
padded
cells are dark and dank;
-
in some cases prisoners have no access to
toilets and have to use slopping-out buckets
kept inside the isolation cell, which, as a
consequence, can be very fetid;
-
some prisoners are kept naked while in
solitary confinement;
-
prisoners are not permitted to keep books,
radios, or any personal belongings in
isolation cells.
·
Some prisoners are reported to spend very
extensive periods in solitary confinement.
Furthermore, records about placement in and exit
from isolation cells are not accurately kept, and
were often missing.
AI is concerned - including on the basis of the
opinion of numerous medical experts - that prolonged