For over thirty years, David McDonald worked in Ireland’s biggest prisons. He started out with a baptism of fire in 1989 in Mountjoy, before returning to his hometown two years later to Portlaoise Prison, which – due to the presence of IRA and other subversive prisoners – was then the most secure prison in Europe. He then moved on to the new Midlands prison, where Ireland’s emerging class of serious gangsters were housed. Here he dealt with notorious household names like John Gilligan, Christy Kinahan, Brian Meehan, Dessie O’Hare and, more recently, killers like Graham Dwyer, in his average working day.

Mick Clifford, award-winning Examiner journalist, worked with McDonald on a book to bring together the story that illustrates the boredom, the constant tension, the flashpoints of extreme violence, and the moments of comedy, tragedy and surprising humanity that are part and parcel of working in prisons.

In this extract, David writes about the beginnings of a riot.

I was in the screening area of the Midlands Prison when the call came through. It was 5.20pm on 28 December 2012. “Get down to the circle,” I was told. “We have a situation.”

In that instant I was torn between the high of an adrenalin rush and the sinking feeling that the evening was not going to unfold as had been planned. After a straight month at work I was already halfway out the gate. Having missed any kind of a break over Christmas, I had a few days off coming to me. Now, with the door in sight, I was being hauled back to the present with a bang.

When I arrived at the circle, I was met by one of the governors. He told me that all the prisoners in D division were out on the landings. They were tooled up and refusing to go into their cells.

“What do they want?” I asked.

“They want you gone, out of here, transferred,” I was told.

D block in the Midlands Prison housed some of the most notorious prisoners in the state, the kind of gangland figures who often feature in the media. Some of them had murdered. A few of them were at the level where they ordered murders. Before being imprisoned, these men had run mini empires. Inside, they still managed to maintain their status as significant players in the drugs business.

And that was their problem with me.

I was in charge of the OSG, the Operational Support Group, in the Midlands. One of our main tasks was to stop the flow of contraband into prisons. The two big items are drugs and phones. Both multiply in value once they make it inside a prison’s gates. As on the outside, the season of goodwill is celebrated in prison. Not being in a position to stroll down to the local pub for a few extra pints, prisoners make do with drugs other than alcohol.

So, I’m standing there, digesting the news that I am the focus of what is building up to be a riot. There were about 150 prisoners on the three landings in D division and 80 staff in the whole prison at the time. Naturally, I was far from relaxed about what was happening.

There was no way we could let the men stay out on the landings all night. That would have been a concession. Their protest was a show of strength, and it was important that we regained control. There was every possibility of violence. The officers who had been on the landings reported that the prisoners were tooled up with the usual weapons. Somebody saw one of them waving a pool ball in a sock. We didn’t know but assumed that they also had a good share of chivs: home-made knives in which razor blades are melted into toothbrush handles.

First thing I directed was the monitoring of the internal phones. Now that the prisoners on D division had the run of the place, they would be using the opportunity to call home. Intelligence garnered from the calls would help assess what we were up against, and what exactly they wanted – apart from my head. The calls were as we had expected:

“It’s kicking off tonight . . .”

“We’re tooled up and ready for them . . .”

“That bastard McDonald is going to get his . . .”

We’ll show them that we’re not taking their shit . . .”

The tone of the calls sounded like the prisoners were united. There were three landings on D division, so if the calls had suggested that most of the boys looking for trouble were on just one, then we could isolate that landing, cut the head off the snake. But the intelligence coming back from the calls was that all three landings were involved. That was going to make our job a lot more difficult.

The other bit of intelligence we took from the calls was that they really had it in for me personally. In their enclosed world, I had graduated from party pooper to the devil incarnate. I rang the chief.

“Ben, we have a situation.”

Unlocked: An Irish Prison Officer’s Story by David McDonald with Mick Clifford, is published by Sandycove and out now.