CRIMINALS ARE DELIVERING drugs and weapons to inmates using drones with burning packages slung beneath them in order to burn through the netting covering prison yards, sources have told The Journal.
The new method has been spotted around Mountjoy and Wheatfield Prisons in Dublin recently.
The drones are flown from nearby roads and fields with the burning packages carried beneath the remote-controlled craft.
Sources said that in many cases the packages slung below the drones had a flammable substance on the exterior that burned through the netting, concealing a smaller capsule or package inside containing the contraband.
Once the net has been burned through, prisoners below pick up the delivery.
Netting has been placed across yards in many of the country’s prisons in order to prevent drugs or weapons from being thrown over. They’re usually made of a heavy duty material, but with small holes like a fishing net.
The use of drones has been previously documented by the Irish Prison Service and the Prison Officers Association but the use of the flaming packages is a new and novel approach.
Another method being used by criminals supplying drugs, sources said, is to throw rotting fruit onto the nets so that as the fruit decays the drugs inside fall through the nets.
Before the nets were installed, prisoners were often supplied with drugs, phones and weapons by drones being flown straight into their cells. Criminals have been trying these novel new methods in order circumvent the nets and other barriers.
The advent of drone deliveries has almost ended the practice of people smuggling drugs into prisons via other routes. A source said that phones and weapons are now prevalent due to the ease of delivering them by the unmanned craft. The weapons are usually blades, often makeshift ones known as ‘shivs’.
“Assaults were much less prevalent before, but now there is almost an assault on a prison officer every week,” a source said.
The Irish Prison Service (IPS) has been working with State authorities to try and find a way to limit the drone encroachments.
Gardaí are understood to also be working on procuring specialist devices to take down drones. Sources have said this may benefit the IPS also.
At a recent Prison Officers Association (POA) conference in May the organisation raised serious concerns about the use of drones.
In a speech at the seminar Tony Power, President of the POA, strongly criticised the lack of urgency to combat the drone threat.
Power said that the drone deliveries were almost daily across the prison estate.
Power said that the IPS purchased Interceptor drones that were never used and anti-drone technology that did not work.
Figures show that in 2023, 1,272 mobile phones were recovered in searches at prisons, there were 1,294 drug finds and 308 weapon seizures.
A spokesperson for the IPS refused to comment on the reports of the drones containing flammable packages.
“The Irish Prison Service is committed to preventing the access of contraband into prisons and continues to be a high priority for the Irish Prison Service.
“The Irish Prison Service has committed to continuing to invest in new technologies and measures to support our efforts to keep contraband out of prisons,” the spokesperson said.
The IPS said that there has been an increase in intelligence-led cell searches, sniffer dogs and also a greater focus on deliveries.
The IPS also said it is continuing to liaise with gardaí and that there is a constant flow of intelligence between the organisations.
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