This is a special report into Limerick Prison since housing three male prisoners in the women’s wing. The full report is below. 👇
Limerick-Prison-COVID-19-Thematic-Inspection-Report-2021
I did a piece on Barbie Kardashian for Graham Linehan’s substack; a seriously disturbed young man with convictions for violent attacks on women. Brought up by an abusive father he was recruited to join in the violent assaults on his mother. I have reproduced this on my blog with a link to the court case which brought this young boy to my attention. Now he identifies as a “woman” and has been transferred to the female estate, in Limerick Prison. He has not only committed serious violence against women but he threatens sexual violence and has a specific resentment for the female sex.
I blogged on him here. Article contains links to the original court transcript, relating to a previous detention order. This was prior to his current conviction for which I have not managed to get a court transcript.
Limerick Prison was subject to an official inspection in April 2021. At that time three males, with a transgender identity, were held in the female estate. Limerick Prison houses both males and females who are, normally, held separately.

Because males are generally held in the estate suitable for their sex the inspections cover the male and the female experience. For the females one of the issues raised was lack of access to tampons even through there was a scheme to provide them free of charge.

The other issues mentioned were the lack of any toilet facilities, for females, in the exercise yard. There were facilities for males. Without a trace of irony the inspection report points out their own recommendation which states women should be allowed time to exercise “out of sight of male prisoners”. The total and utter disrespect shown by making female prisons mixed sex and still feigning support for women’s dignity!

That is about as much attention as they gave to female prisoners. But they do spend an inordinate length of time angsting about the male sex /violent offenders they have put on the women’s wing.

The Yogyakarta principles are a document drawn up by some of the more extreme trans-activists. These principles have no standing in international law despite being referred to by many HuMAN rights organisations, who claim they promote best practice. One of the men involved recently broke ranks to criticise them and admit that too little thought was given to the rights of women. Robert Wintemute, one of the signatories, to the principles admits the rights of women were not given sufficient consideration. 👇

The Irish Prison Inspectorate seems to have fully aligned with the Yogyakarta principles as they demonstrate below. 👇 Note the prisoner has a voice about where they are placed in the prison accommodation. What about the women?

Ireland operates on the self-identification principle such that even a male with a history of violent/sexual abuse of women is not precluded from obtaining a gender recognition certificate. There is no safeguarding built into this process. Any man who claims to identify as a “woman” is granted a GRC. This has created the inhumane policy of housing males in female prisons. (Not just Ireland, by the way, Scotland allows “self-id” and so do England. There are no female prisons in Wales. I don’t know the situation in Northern Ireland).
Now we come to the conditions in which the males, with a claimed trans-identity, are held. They are held in their prison cells for 23 out of 24 hours. They appear to have single cells, which are somewhat of a rarity in Irish prisons. I agree it is inhuman to restrict prisoners in this way, unless the alternative is to expose women to risk. Notice the Irish prison service have adopted the language of gender identity ideologues so you have to do some mental gymnastics to realise we are not talking about women here. We are talking about males. At least one of those males is a grave danger to women.

The situation for these detainees is, I agree, likely to be causing them psychological harm. However, the risk to females, if they were allowed free association, is likely to be more than psychological.

If ever there was a prisoner that could use access to a “listening” service whilst in prison this person would appear to be one. However, having read some prisoner accounts of the “listener” service it would appear it is not an unmitigated good. The service is run by other prisoners and there are reports some use information shared, by vulnerable prisoners, for nefarious reasons. It is not clear if the “listeners” are male or female.

I would agree. 👆 the prison service are in an impossible position. Forced to allocate dangerous males, in a female wing, afraid of the consequences of fully unleashing them on the female population, then criticised for segregating them. Either the trans-identified, and male, prisoner is placed in a solitary /segregated scenario or they are allowed to mix with “general population”. The population referenced here would appear to mean the women on the wing. The prison service would be forced to deploy staff to protect, potential, female victims.

The Prison confirms that the processes needed to protect these trans-identified males are labour intensive. Nowhere do the prison inspectors cover the issue of the risk to actual females by forcing the prison to adopt the, naive, recommendations of the Yogyakarta Principles. They do at least manage to include a reference to female staff being coerced into giving bodily searches to males.
The prisoners have complained about mis-gendering so naturally the prison staff are also to be forced to undergo re-education programmes. Prison staff will be forced to call a violent male, with a deep seated loathing of women “Barbie”.

The prison inspectorate mandates prison staff should receive training on LGBT + issues. They do not recommend any training covering the impact, on females, of being housed with males. Males, let me remind you, with histories of violence /sex offending against women. This is despite the fact that female prisoners have been shown to be disproportionately impacted by domestic violence and sexual assaults, by men.

As far as I can ascertain the requirement to draft a new policy has not yet been undertaken or is not yet published on the Irish Prison service website. The inspectorate makes clear, in its action plan, they will be closely monitoring compliance with the LGBT+ training. This will be developed in collaboration with an appropriate civil society organisation, which, I infer, means a Trans Lobby group. The transgender prisoners will also get a voice in this training. Not the women. The Inspectorate also require attendance numbers and frequency of delivery/updates to the training programme. Big Brother is watching you!

The interesting double-think required for these policies is evident in the policy written for the Scottish Prison Service. The policy for trans-identified females, in Scotland, specifically highlights the danger of sexual assault to a female held in the male estate. Trans-identified men are invariably held in the female estate. Sex would appear to matter for the trans community after all. The Scottish policy does claim the trans-identified females should be given a choice. The other women get no choice about forcible detention with males.

Would love to see the LGBT training materials the prison are now using. They provided them, to the inspectorate, in June 2021. They don’t appear to be available on their website.

When will they listen to women’s groups?