The fight for Segregation in Maghaberry - Ciaran Murphy
The fight for Segregation in Maghaberry
A short history of a long struggle
Background
By October 2000 the last wave of Long Kesh POWs were finally being
released, in line with the terms of the Good Friday Agreement and
along with their counterparts in Magilligan, Portlaoise, Britain and
elsewhere.
For those republicans not subscribing to the GFA however, and who
still faced the prospect of gaol, a growing and urgent question was
that of ‘what will our status be if captured and imprisoned’.
As a clear gesture of hostility to opponents of the new era; ‘Good
Friday’ expressed its intention to reverse any gains made during the
prison struggles of previous decades. The advances made in 1981 lasted
barely ninteen years.
This would be of particular relevance to prisoners in the North where
a denial of ‘political status’ would almost certainty culminate in
forced integration with Loyalist prisoners and unavoidable physical
conflict behind bars.
Furthermore the screws who had manned the H-Blocks up until their
closure and who now controlled keys of Maghaberry (the destination for
all future republican prisoners) were adamant that never again would
they go back to a system such as that which existed “in the Maze”. As
far as the prison administration was concerned, there were no
political prisoners, only criminals, they certainly would not tolerate
a ‘republican wing’. Their de-facto union (the POA) held resolutely to
this position, and still do.
The first Anti – GFA republican prisoners forced into the Maghaberry
system arrived in January 1999, captured following a Continuity IRA
gun attack on Woodbourne barracks. Immediately upon their arrival the
ramifications of the GFA were visited upon them.
Despite being arrested by undercover British soldiers, held and
questioned under the prevention of terrorism act and remanded by a
diplock judge, these POWs once through the prison gate were
immediately assigned the status of criminal.
“Them days are over kid” was the stark but honest reply given by one
Maghaberry screw when the first of the new POWs asserted his
principled wish not to be housed with criminal inmates.
The public atmosphere at the time was one of widespread almost
militant hostility to Anti-GFA republicanism; the Omagh tragedy was at
the forefront of people’s minds and the rights of prisoners was of
concern to nobody, apart from the prisoners themselves and those
closest to them.
The Loyalists
There had always been a significant Loyalist presence in Maghaberry
due both to the fractured nature of loyalist groups (mainly UDA, LVF
and Orange Volunteers) and the willingness of those groups to recruit
young criminals behind bars.
Even at their strongest, republican POWs remained outnumbered, by a
broadly estimated five to one. This factor, coupled with the blatant
Orange sympathies of the screws, whose catchment area lies mainly
between Lisburn and Portadown, made for a situation where physical
attacks on republicans became a certainty.
As on the outside, loyalists groups when in prison tend to be led by
those who can exercise the most macho prowess, the vastly outnumbered
and vulnerable republican presence in Maghaberry would for years prove
an irresistible target for those Loyalists keen to visibly flex their
muscle and hold onto their never secure titles.
Isolation and intimidation
Upon arrival, all Maghaberry prisoners are placed in the committals
wing, a grim and noisy maze of dirty over crowded cells called ‘Lagan
House’, here they would wait for a week while supposedly being given
fire lectures and be assessed on factors such as mental vulnerability
or history of sexual offences.
For republicans however the committal period was an opportunity for
the prisons so-called ‘security officers’ to assess them on grounds of
likely political allegiance, rank and possible personal influence.
Without exception, they were then dispersed around the prison to serve
there time away from any comradely support and literally at the mercy
of any passing Loyalist.
In later years this ‘dispersal policy’ would prove to be a vital
advantage for republican POWs who brought chaos to the gaol, shutting
it down entirely. For those in first however (outnumbered at times by
fifteen to one) it was like being fed to the lions.
From 1999 onwards, isolated and vulnerable Irish republican POWs were
being hospitalised in Maghaberry prison. They were set upon in the
canteen, in their cells, in the yard and even while on the phone
talking to their loved ones.
Under the noses of security cameras observed constantly by screws,
republican POWs were being savagely set upon by loyalists and their
criminal sidekicks, men were beaten viciously with Irons and pool
cues, scalded with hot water and kicked unconscious.
Interestingly and despite attempted murder occurring on their wings,
Maghaberry screws insisted on cleaning up the scenes of these crimes
before the arrival of the RUC.
The roots of protest
In these surroundings, individual republican prisoners did what they
had to survive. Some embarked upon their own individual ‘dirty’
protests, an unnerving prospect given that their very personal
gestures would take place in the communal recreation rooms and
canteens, thus forcing themselves to be segregated or removed to safer
wings. While not knowing it at the time these individuals set the
standard for the larger ‘dirty protest’ of Summer 2003.
As time moved on and the numbers of republicans increased, retaliation
was sought on at least some of the aggressors, Maghaberry legend has
it that a veteran republican / socialist from Derry who had been
attacked with an Iron earlier in the year took the time to heat the
same Iron up before seeking out and using it on his attacker in his
own cell. The man in question is also notoriously quiet and so
impossible to get verification from.
On another occasion a young west Belfast republican, in on a charge
for possessing explosives was asked to accompany his OC to the gym to
help deliver a message to a senior Loyalist warning of retaliation
should any more republicans be attacked.
Unfortunately for the loyalist who at the time was lying on his back
lifting weights, the rural OCs understanding of delivering a message
differed greatly from the west Belfast understanding of ‘delivering a
message’, as before the OC got a word out his young comrade took the
opportunity to punch the face off the now vulnerable and outnumbered
Loyalist, needless to say the screws weren’t so slow to act,
nevertheless the loyalist got the message.
On other wings within the prison, republican POWs while outnumbered
found ingenious ways of coping with the odds. Again legend has it that
with some meticulous observation, patience, heat and a handful of
bullets, a lone prisoner brought a ‘notorious Loyalist hard man’ to
his knees one evening as he waited for his toast to cook in an empty
communal canteen.
Men did what they could.
Republicans continued to be attacked however and always would be until
segregation was achieved and a republican wing secured.
Outside support
By 2001, the largest body of republican prisoners in Maghaberry, about
thirty in all, was represented by the Irish Republican Prisoners
Welfare Association (IRPWA) often accused by the press of supporting
POWs belonging to the ‘Real IRA’.
In that year, angered by the vulnerability of the Maghaberry POWs the
IRPWA set out on the uphill task of raising awareness of the plight of
the men inside.
Their task coincided with their recent proscription in America, they
were banned in the USA following the lobbying of Pro-GFA parties an
act which threatened to deprive many prisoners’ children of vitally
needed ‘PDF’, basic monetary support of around £60 per month per
prisoners family.
A tour of white line pickets was embarked upon with barely a town in
the six counties not receiving a visit, many towns like Coalisland and
Derry City received several. During the GAA season, clones and
Casement Park in Belfast were also cornered.
The efforts at awareness raising met with no small degree of success,
this despite the best efforts of the pro-GFA ‘Belfast media group’
(the Andersonstown news) who throughout the campaign harangued and
ridiculed the efforts of the prisoners families and supporters on
every occasion, unashamedly and to the point of making collecting for
prisoners dependents an extremely difficult task in west Belfast.
Although they changed tact later in the campaign, their earliest
efforts in destroying support will never be forgotten by activists of
the time.
While many former H-Block prisoners offered moral support at least,
some unfortunately chose to mock the Maghaberry POWs, one former
blanket man from west Belfast openly referred to them at a ‘Saoirse’
meeting in London as ‘those Wankers in Maghaberry’ adding ‘as far as
im concerned they can rot’.
It has to be said unfortunately that this was not an uncommon
sentiment in republican west Belfast at the time.
Still with a placard or megaphone in one hand and a collection bucket
in the other the IRPWA sacrificed their weekends for years on end, to
both fight forced integration in Maghaberry and fundraise for
prisoners dependents.
As time went on however, and campaigning with all its time and travel
became increasingly tedious (indeed as many of the protestors found
themselves in Lagan house) the attacks were still occurring inside,
and the world outside of the staunch republican centres of population
knew little of Maghaberry, nor in truth did it care.
In the words of a crude west Belfast mural of the time, Maghaberry
remained ‘Stormonts best kept secret’.
Ironically given the slogan on the crude mural, it was Stormonts
difficulty which proved to be the POWs opportunity.
On the morning of October 4th 2002, Sinn Fein’s Stormont offices where
raided by the PSNI amid claims of a Provisional IRA spy ring operating
within the walls of that institution, days later Unionists pulled out
of all proceedings and finally on the October 14th the British
government pulled the plug once more on the devolved stormont
assembly. Sinn Fein’s broad support base was again forced to accept
direct British rule, again for an unforeseen period, to the
celebration of unionism and at the hands of the PSNI/RUC.
For the first time since the ‘leadership led’ Sinn Fein peace process
began, significant numbers of people in republican areas while perhaps
remaining loyal, began at least to question the wisdom of the whole
stormont project from a republican perspective.
This development was of massive significance to Anti-GFA republicans
and their supporters, who for years had occupied the lonely spot
reserved for the political lunatic.
Now our arguments against the potential of the stormont project held
some tangible weight, how could any institution so vulnerable to the
whim of the British be central to a republican project?
The now small army of serial street protestors, friends and supporters
of the beleaguered Maghaberry POWs, no longer appeared so stupid in
the eyes of passers by, they noticed this and it put a well needed
spring in their step.
Long hot summer 2003 … ‘dirty protest’
The summer of 2003 was the hottest on record, across Europe people
were dying in hospital of heat related complications and in Maghaberry
prison Irish Republican POWs, their numbers now brought up to more
than thirty took the decision to remove the strain from their
protesting families outside and force the issue of segregation to a
conclusion.
Mindful of growing political discontent in republican areas and the
volatility which could be added to the situation by a serious prison
protest, sentenced POWs embarked on the first republican ‘dirty / no
wash’ protest of the new century.
They began smearing their own excrement onto their cell walls on the
night of June 23rd. Then smashed their cells to pieces leaving the
floors flooded with water.
The following morning screws heavily backed up by the riot team opened
cell doors to be informed by each nervous protesting prisoner that
they had embarked on a ‘no wash protest, for segregation’.
Then at each cell a virtual ceremony took place; the screw would
retreat, a ‘Senior officer’ was called, the screws would return and an
order would be given for the prisoner to clean his cell, the order
would be refused and the prisoner placed ‘on report’. Then he sat and
waited, usually for 3-4 days, he would be fed in his cell, and each
day he continued to smear his excrement onto his walls.
The tactic of dirty protest had two strong advantages, firstly it was
the weapon used by the blanket men of the H-Blocks, their penultimate
resort. The protesting Maghaberry POWs rightly drew comparisons with
their struggle and that which occurred in the H-Blocks, more
importantly so did the republican grass roots, a fact borne out by the
increasing presence of what were traditionally Sinn Fein minded
supporters on IRPWA picket lines.
Supposed advocates of the ‘peace process’ conversing and networking
with families and supporters ‘Dissident republicans’, was something
that in a political vacuum could not be ignored by Britain for long.
The streets were becoming politicised and inevitably debate was taking
place on the picket lines about the new political situation, people
were networking who in the minds of the state shouldn’t have been.
Unwittingly the general tension was added to by another protest over
which republicans had no control. Simultaneously to the republican
protest, a number of criminal prisoners successfully climbed onto the
roof of Bush house and proceeded to sunbathe for days on end.
Of course lazy journalism being what it is, reporters couldn’t resist
pretending for the cameras’ that the men seen walking about on the
roof shouting down about pizza’s and beer were ‘protesting dissident
republicans’. Inside the republicans were appalled, in retrospection
however it kept the issue in the news and in general conversation and
it probably did no harm.
The second important advantage of the ‘dirty protest’ was the mass
disruption it brought to the gaol as a whole. In the simmering heat,
the stench emanating from a single cell could reach an entire tightly
packed corridor.
This factor was visited doubly to the prison authorities when on July
7th the remand prisoners too embarked on the protest.
For three years the prison administration had deliberately dispersed
all republican prisoners across the gaol until they numbered maybe
only one or two on each wing, as such by July 2003 they had helped
spread the protest to every house in the Maghaberry institution.
Now the ‘dispersal policy’ used with such vigour against republican
prisoners and designed to isolate them was being utilised by the
prisoners themselves, who provided they were willing to suffer the
discomfort of a ‘dirty protest’ had the power to shut down the entire
gaol.
From experience, republican POWs know that screws as people are
prepared to endure very little for their wages, and having to endure
the smell of human excrement all summer long is not something they
will agree to without kicking up a mighty fuss, soon they were walking
off in their droves. The prison operated on a skeleton staff for the
whole of the summer with only the most dedicated (or best paid)
remaining, meanwhile the rest of the prison population suffered
greatly, not only from the smell but from the long hot periods of lock
up which could last for days on end and during which little or no
contact could be made with the outside.
The waiting game
Though the Maghaberry POWs drew comparisons with the H- Block struggle
they also knew they were in a very different situation, their numbers
were miniscule compared to the blanket men, worse still their
bargaining power in terms of outside pressure was limited in the
extreme.
It was too small a protest to sustain public interest for a
significant length of time, as such some of the POWs had already
decided they would not lie pointlessly in their own dirt for years
without taking the next step.
The ‘dirty protest’ followed a process, after 4-5 days in his own
cell, becoming increasingly dirty and bearded, the POW would after
being put ‘before the governor’ be sent to ‘the boards’ or solitary
confinement where he would remain in complete solitude for a set
period usually five days. During this time he refrained from smearing
excrement and for one reason, had he continued while on the boards the
prison administration could order he be kept there in order to prevent
him from causing a disturbance amongst the main prison population.
Given the opportunity, the gaol would certainly have preferred to keep
him there in the one spot, if all POWs were on the punishment block
and on a dirty protest then the Gaol and the British government could
live with that indefinitely, rather than concede to the ‘dissidents’.
So the prisoner abstained for 5 days while in the SSU, then he was
returned to his cell where he resumed his protest, and on and on the
cycle went. Predictably the Gaol used a mans abstaining period on the
boards to claim to the press that he had come off the protest. This
was personally very frustrating, as time in solitary is tougher than
any other time.
In this time many tactics were used in an attempt to break the POWs
resolve, some were ghosted out of Maghaberry and sent to Magilligan,
sleep deprivation was used, a form of white noise treatment was used
day and night, general humiliation and threats were used in great
measure, men were viciously beaten, pulled out of their cells as walls
were hosed down, and then dragged to the boards and at times vital
medication was withdrawn from POWs including epileptics.
A favourite tactic of the screws was to only half hose down a
prisoner’s cell then force two protesters to switch cells, in this way
men were forced to live not only in their own dirt but also in other
peoples. No doubt this tactic was learned in earlier decades, possibly
passed on in the Maghaberry arms, favourite watering hole for screws
past and present.
From early on the prison administration had assigned to protestors the
status of ‘contaminated’, this gave them the ability to deny visits
unless all their clothing had been taken from them and ‘sanitised’.
This of course gave them a massive power over the POWs as it was quite
simple to just claim that their cloths had not yet been washed or had
been lost while the POWs family were left waiting in the carpark and
their visit eventually cancelled.
There is no greater way to hurt a prisoner than hurt his family, the
prison administration crudely hoped this hurt might just force a man
off his protest, at least one was offered a visit if he wore prison
clothing while his own were being ‘sanitised’, he just turned his back
on them.
At this stage it was a battle of wills, and the republican will held out.
POW Donald Knox R.I.P
During this short but bitter dispute, the heartless and bleak
surroundings of Maghaberry punishment unit was before he fell ill, the
final home for Don Knox, a protesting republican POW from Lurgantarry
in Lurgan Co.Armagh.
Don was serving a sentence for possession of arms and explosives when
he joined in the Maghaberry protest.
One evening in late July and while in the punishment unit (most likely
Foyle house), Don shouted up the wing to a comrade that he felt
unwell, later in the evening he shouted again that he was being taken
out on request of the doctor.
Don had unknowingly been suffering from cancer, he was taken from
Maghaberry and died in hospital on June 14th 2004.
The next step?
In all this time however the Maghaberry administration did not once
play their ace card. Unknown to some of the POWs at the time, the
administration had the legal right to keep individual protesting
prisoners on the boards in mere ‘anticipation’ that they would create
a disturbance (in other words resume the dirty protest) should they
return to the main population.
Had they choose that road then the small three month ‘dirty protest’,
which was completely reliant upon the short term political
difficulties outside as well as on the operational difficulties of the
prison administration inside, would have lost what little leverage it
had.
With this possibility in mind some months earlier, a select few of the
Maghaberry POWs had in the presence of a solicitor forwarded their
names for hunger strike, asking not to be taken off should they fall
into a coma.
These were republicans of integrity and stubborn resolve who
undoubtedly would have seen it through, perhaps the Brits knew this
and recognising the potential for major disorder in a vacuum, and
moved before the prison authorities could.
Britain capitulates to Maghaberry POWs
The Maghaberry administration never got its chance to play their ace card.
Instead in mid August British secretary of state Paul Murphy
commissioned a ‘review of safety’ at Maghaberry prison, to be carried
out by ‘John Steele’ ‘former NIO director of security policy’.
Upon hearing of the initiating of this report, the POWs weighing up
the situation both inside and outside (including reports of massive
street protests) felt the wind at last change in their favour,
although both experience and books had taught them to never trust the
Brits when it come to a prison dispute. The protest would go on till a
conclusion was confirmed either way.
Confirmation of sorts came on the morning of Sunday 13th Sept. On
hearing a series of slamming doors outside their cells and the order
to ‘lock up’, protesting POWs realised that screws were again walking
off the wings en masse, the prospect of a ‘republican wing’ had
obviously been spelt out to them as the reality it would be, and true
to their nature Her Majesties Prison officers were acting like spoiled
children.
Some of their more reasonable number later came into the POWs cells
and simply instructed them to ‘pack your bags, your moving’.
Later in the day, a minibus full of bearded young men many who had
never before met, smiled as they were driven off to their new wing.
The lesson of this short struggle is simple, timing is everything.