In turn the official expressed the view to us that a written history of the Northern Ireland Prison would not go amiss. The absence of it had left a serious gap in the literature on the prison experience. Much had already been penned from the prisoner perspective. We conceded there was some merit in that suggestion. The Chris Ryder account Inside The Maze purported to tell the story but never managed to. Since our conversation in England Governor by William McKee has been published. It was more about his own experience as a jail governor than about the prison service per se. So, without doubt, there is a vacuum that needs filled.
Our reason for agreeing that the story of the prison service should be told was simple although not one shared by the British official. The service had been such a violent prison gang that for it to pass off into history without its violence being narrated seemed such a travesty that any decision to give it the full Monty could only be welcome.
In an as yet unpublished review of Governor I made the following observation: ‘when prison staff are not held in check by prisoners their tendency towards violence increases proportionally.’ Violence and bullying by screws has always been endemic to prison life. Had it not been for the brutality of prison staff during the blanket protest the fatality rate for its off-duty members at the hands of the IRA would have been considerably lower.
Anyone who thinks screws in the North have become susceptible to a greater degree of professionalism over the years need only look at their behaviour in the lead up to the death by suicide of Maghaberry prisoner Colin Bell. Same old same old. Bell, a deeply disturbed and distressed individual, died while those supposed to be observing him for his own safety slept through it all, indifferent to the drama unfolding in front of their shuteye.
So, while shocking it came as no surprise to read a statement put out by an old comrade from prison, Danny McBrearty, highlighting the violence of Maghaberry screws against the Lurgan republican, Colin Duffy. According to the former prisoner who is now the National Chairperson of the Republican Network for Unity, Colin Duffy was assaulted first by two screws during a strip search and then by the ‘heavies’ of the Control and Restraint Unit:
Mr Duffy’s family have confirmed the extensive injuries he sustained as a result of this savage attack, as a result of having received blows to the head, face and upper body he now has severe bruising. The Republican Network for Unity understand that the two prison officers, not used to escort Mr Duffy at any time before, deliberately used the regular video-linked remand hearing to orchestrate the attack upon him. Both were making very insulting, provocative remarks to him beforehand and then used the excuse of the search procedures to carry out an unprovoked assault.
There is nothing that gives me cause to doubt the veracity of Danny McBrearty’s claim. For years we had to listen to the NIO praise the thugs of the Northern Ireland Prison Service and defend them against allegations of brutality which we prisoners either experienced or witnessed on a almost daily basis. Of the literally thousands of assaults carried out by screws during the blanket protest how many were ever acknowledged as having happened by the NIO? My recollection is that one drunken thug was demoted down to basic grade after he launched an unprovoked assault on a teenage blanket man.
Closed institutions are home to a wide range of illegal activities including violence and many forms of abuse. The screws are all too eager to put the boot in when someone of the status of Colin Duffy is served up to them. When the former H-Block IRA sentenced prisoner, Gary Kearney, was badly beaten in Maghaberry Prison while on remand a number of years ago too few people highlighted the case. The screws got away with it and as can be seen in the Duffy case are all to willing to deliver a repeat performance and encore if needed.
The screws rely on their victims being out of sight and out of mind. The prisoner depends on the public being made aware of his plight. No effort should be spared in publicising the asssault on Colin Duffy and bringing the thugs responsible to book. Public scrutiny should ensure that prison is a place, if not exactly comfortably, in which the violence of screws at least is abolished and designated a thing of the past.
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ReplyDeleteI read this post with great interest thinking what cruelty was being dished out to prisoners whom were imprisoned in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh at the the time of the "Blanket/Dirty protest. But an apology no I dont think now or ever will the British give one , this in my opinion would be like a 6th demand . I believe the post should inform us that there was a vast difference between those prisoners on protest and prisoners jailed for other offences. As members of the IRA they would have been fully aware that the treatment they recieved would have been well known before they had even being allowed into such an organisation, long jail sentences and possibly death was the words that they all heard. Prison Officers would have been Legitimate Targets regardless of what happened within the jails.
ReplyDeleteThis treatment was a vehicle used by the British against the IRA just the same as "shoot to kill" and both will never be admitted. Books have been written by both prisoners and warders maybe a meeting of heads and hearts between both would make a very interesting read.
Kate, prison staff brutality was initially an attempt to coerce prisoners into wearing the prison uniform. They did not stop prisoners coming out of cells at first but tried to get them to parade naked when going for meals etc. The two main charged against prisoners made routinely were refusing to wear gear and refusing to work.
ReplyDeleteIn essence they could have ran their regime without knocking lumps out of prisoners whether prisoners obeyed rules or not.
No, all the dead screws were not guilty of brutality. Many carried the can for the activity of their colleagues in the H-Blocks.
People who beat are never fall guys. The 'only taking orders' has long carried no weight.
Interested, why would prison staff have been targets regardless of what happened within the jail? There really were only 4 years of the conflict where they were targeted in a consistent manner. The first in 1976, the last in 1980. After that 4 were killed, two of whom were the most violent screws in the H-Blocks who would certainly not have been killed were it not for their role during the protest.
ReplyDeleteWhile I don't bang a drum demanding an apology - the issue only came up in conversation - I don't see how it would be a sixth demand. It is a stand alone issue where prison staff heavily involved in criminal assaults on prisoners should have their role acknowledged, albeit in a way they would never approve.
Screws have long used violence against prisoners. It was frequently dished out as a control mechanism outside the blanket protest. Young Prisoners known as YPs were particularly susceptible to screw assault and those in borstal.
I have spoken to many screws since it all including some who were on the blanket wings; one of the ones I liked most was in charge of our wing from 1978-1980. In civilian life on the outside they can be as decent and unassuming as many other people.
AM your answer as to whether the prison warders were Legitimate Targets regardless of the illtreatment they handed out is of great interest to me, what your post tells me is that if they the warders hadn't meted out this brutality they would never have been killed, sorry but this is not what the PIRA told us for years, anyone who worked for or helped the Brits was a "Legitimate Target". Am I now to believe that the prison warders were not part of the Brit war machine. Was the treatment handed out so cruely not a British government directive so therefor making the Screws targets . The people who built the Blocks were targets why would the the people who ran them be different ?
ReplyDeleteInterested, the first prison officer killed was in 1976 after political status was withdrawn but before the blanket protest and real brutality began. There had been a former prison officer shot dead in 1974. The campaign in earnest against them began after the beginning of the blanket protest and ended prior to the hunger strikes. There were four killed after the hunger strikes, two of whom were central to brutality in the H Blocks, one by mistake or because he was an easy target and another because he was trying to introduce a hard line post-the escape. If the prison staff were viewed as part of the British war machine without distinction, why were they not targeted with more consistency? When the IRA in South Armagh captured 5 screws along with one RUC member, Louis Robinson, why were the screws released and he shot dead? You raise a good point if builders could be targeted why not prison staff. But the evidence does not lend itself to any other conclusion. I think much of it had to do with the working relationship that had to be established between prisoners and prison staff.
ReplyDeleteScrews would be perhaps the most reactionary arm of the state's security forces I have had the misfortune to come across. The UDR/RIR are well placed in that league but the N.I.P.S would clinch it due to their capacity for 24/7 xenophobic performances displayed towards a literally captive audience.
ReplyDeleteI once saw that large moustached screw who seems to have a penchant for appearing in the media (usually in documentaries lamenting the awful time his co-workers had to endure while they got paid triple-time for beating prisoners) drunkenly scream anti-immigration obscenities into the face of a young female Roma Big Issue seller outside the old GPO in Belfast. Now that little incident happened at one of the busiest times of the day in central Belfast with potentially scores of witnesses and it made me rightly suspect that he would be less restrained with someone who had offended against his herrenvolk sensibilities in the totalitarian environment of Maghaberry's boards with perhaps a few more subsidised drinks in him?
Small wonder that the BNP recruits heavily within the prison service and with a few exceptions, it has been my experience that the average screw has a worldview to the right of wild Willie Frazer. I suspect that screws are conditioned to hate prisoners for being the cause of their dullard lives. Seriously, how many kids have ever said they want to be a prison officer when they grow up?