Inmate numbers at Cork Prison at record high: 107 without a bed

There were 403 inmates in Cork Prison yesterday, the highest figure on record.

The prison previously hit this record-setting figure when 403 people were incarcerated on August 19.

While figures had fallen slightly in the interim, they have remained consistently over the 296-bed capacity.

Currently, 107 inmates do not have a bed, representing 27%, as the prison is at 136% capacity. This is above the national average, which is 124%.

Newly published figures from the Irish Prison Service (IPS) for last year show that 80 women and 438 men with addresses in Cork were imprisoned, a total of 518 people, down from 550 the previous year.

Annual figures from the IPS previously highlighted by The Echo showed that assaults in the prison increased significantly in this time, while contraband seizures decreased.

In Cork Prison in 2024, there were 135 prisoner-on-prisoner assaults, 15 direct physical assaults by prisoners on staff members, and three “additional aggressive and threatening incidents”.

There were 10 mobile phone, 12 weapon, and 40 drug seizures in 2024, a total of 62, which was down on 84 in 2022 and 114 in 2021.

Nationally, new figures show that, in 2024, the vast majority of persons committed to prison were Irish nationals, accounting for 75.4% of the total.

This was followed by individuals from the EU, who made up 11.7%.

In 2024, the most common reason for imprisonment nationally was theft and related offences, accounting for 1,012 sentences, followed closely by offences against government, justice procedures, and organised crime, accounting for 920 sentences.

Attempts or threats to murder, assaults, harassment, and related offences were the third most common offences, totalling 737 sentences, followed by controlled drug offences (603), public order and other social code offences (492), and road and traffic offences (422).

Sexual offences accounted for 374 sentences, followed by burglary (312), damage to property and the environment (278), dangerous or negligent acts (185), weapons and explosives offences (166), and fraud and deception (153).

The least common offences leading to imprisonment were robbery, extortion, and hijacking (95), homicide (44), and kidnapping, at 15 sentences.