Join the School of Law and Criminology in Maynooth University for the launch of the report on 'Access to Justice: Legal Pathways to Justice for the Rights of People in Prison’. This report is authored by Dr Amina Adanan with the research assistance of Andrea Pownall, both of Maynooth University. This work analyses the barriers and issues that arise in public interest prison law in Ireland and is funded by the Irish Research Council. The Irish Penal Reform Trust (IPRT) is the civic society project partner for this research. IPRT is the leading penal reform organisation in Ireland and is the expert civil society organisation in this area.
The launch of the report takes place online on 13 September at 2pm (Irish time).
The report will be launched by David C Fathi, renowned US Prison lawyer and Director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) National Prison Project and the event will be chaired by Saoirse Brady, Executive Director of the IPRT.
Sign language interpretation will be provided as part of this event and CPD points are available.
To register for this event, please click here. For more information, please email amina.adanan@mu.ie.
Information on the report
Notwithstanding the notable public interest cases that advance the rights of disadvantaged groups in Ireland, and the positive impact that some prison law cases have had, the rights of people in prison remain under litigated in this jurisdiction. Previous research by IPRT identified that there is a need for an increase in public interest litigation to advance the rights of people in prison in Ireland. Using mixed method research methodologies (doctrinal research and 26 semi-structured interviews), this report identifies and examines the barriers and issues that arise in public interest prison law in order to shed light on this topic and to identify areas for reform. In doing so, the research illustrates a web of inter-connected problems that inhibit prisoner rights issues from being addressed in a legally effective way that protects the rights of those affected. These barriers include, and are not limited to, difficulties in accessing Civil Legal Aid (including operational barriers within the Civil Legal Aid and Legal Aid-Custody Issues schemes), blocks in accessing legal information and legal representation, the general difficulty in prison law litigation, and deference to State authority.
This report concludes with 9 recommendations in the area of:
Reform of Civil Legal Aid and access to information for people in prison.
Necessary reforms in the legal system.
Access to justice in the management and operation of prisons.
The prioritisation of the State’s ratification of OPCAT.
Embedding prison law in legal education.
Event speakers
David C Fathi
David C Fathii is Director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) National Prison Project. The ACLU National Prison Project brings legal challenges to conditions of confinement in prisons, jails, and other detention facilities, and works to end the policies that have given the United States the highest incarceration rate in the world. David worked as a staff lawyer at the Project for more than ten years before becoming director in 2010, and has special expertise in challenging ‘supermax’ prisons, where prisoners are held for months or years at a time in conditions of near-total isolation. From 2012 to 2015 he represented the ACLU in negotiations leading to adoption of the United Nations Revised Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, known as the ‘Nelson Mandela Rules’.
Saoirse Brady
Saoirse joined IPRT as Executive Director in May 2022. Prior to joining IPRT, she most recently worked as Head of Legal, Policy and Public Affairs at the Children’s Rights Alliance, a role she held since 2016. Saoirse previously worked with the Alliance as Research and Projects Manager and with a number of leading rights organisations, including the Free Legal Advice Centres (FLAC), Front Line Defenders and the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Saoirse has also acted as an independent consultant for the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC), Scottish Human Rights Commission (SHRC) and CORU – the Health and Social Care Regulator.
Dr Amina Adanan
Dr Amina Adanan is Lecturer/ Assistant Professor in Law in Maynooth University’s School of Law and Criminology. Amina’s research areas include how international law applies in domestic legal systems and human rights in Ireland, and she researches and teaches in these areas. In particular, Amina is the co-author of the IPRT report on ‘Sometimes I’m Missing the Words: The rights, needs and experiences of foreign national and minority ethnic groups in the Irish penal system’ (2022) and the author of the report on ‘Access to Justice for People in Prison: An Analysis of Public Interest Prison Law in Ireland’. In 2022, Amina was awarded the New Foundations Award from the Irish Research Council for the project entitled, Advancing the Rights of Prisoners Through Strategic Litigation.
Click here for more information and to register for the event.