Peadar Tóibín
Question:421. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration the country of birth of each prisoner in the Prison Service, by violent crime and nonviolent crime. [54614/26]
View answerThursday, 16 July 2026
Questions (421)
Written answers
I am advised by the Irish Prison Service that while it records self-reported nationality, it does not routinely record country of birth. Accordingly, the requested information in respect of country of birth is not available.
There are over 3,500 offences recorded on the Prisoner Information Management System as determined by the Irish Crime Classification System, which groups certain types of offences together. For example, the group for offences of a sexual nature includes both offences involving direct physical harm to a person and also offences for failure to notify An Garda Síochána of a change of address.
It is not possible to produce a report that will accurately disaggregate offences in the Irish Crime Classification System grouping that might be determined as meeting the definition of ‘violent’ or ‘non-violent’ crime. Identifying specific individuals for which their offence description might be termed ‘violent’ would require a manual trawl of all prisoners against the full suite of offence codes and background circumstances to the crime which would require an inordinate amount of time and resources.
Furthermore, the Irish Prison Service will not always have access to full information of the details of the crime that led An Garda Síochána to choose to bring a charge under a particular offence code. More information on the Irish Crime Classification System is available on the websites of An Garda Síochána and the Central Statistics Office.
For the Deputy’s information, the Irish Prison Service has provided the attached table containing the self-reported nationalities of persons in custody as of 30 June 2026, categorised according to whether the offence for their most significant sentence length is an offence that falls into an Irish Crime Classification System grouping that includes violent offences. It must be noted that some of the people captured in the grouping will be in custody for non-violent crimes.
In addition, to protect the identity of individuals and ensure compliance with data protection legislation, any category containing fewer than five individuals has been suppressed and is reported as ‘<5’.
Nationality Split as per 30th June 2026
|
Nationality |
VIOLENT OFFENCE |
NON-VIOLENT OFFENCE |
|
Irish |
2,788 |
2,002 |
|
Polish |
58 |
58 |
|
Romanian |
56 |
60 |
|
British |
77 |
67 |
|
Lithuanian |
31 |
65 |
|
Nigerian |
28 |
22 |
|
Brazilian |
27 |
29 |
|
Latvian |
20 |
22 |
|
Algerian |
17 |
12 |
|
Afghanistan |
10 |
<5 |
|
Czech |
9 |
9 |
|
Slovak |
9 |
8 |
|
Ukrainian |
9 |
20 |
|
Indian |
8 |
<5 |
|
Moldovan |
8 |
5 |
|
Zimbabwean |
8 |
<5 |
|
Pakistani |
7 |
<5 |
|
Portuguese |
7 |
<5 |
|
Croatian |
6 |
<5 |
|
Moroccan |
6 |
<5 |
|
Philippino |
6 |
<5 |
|
Russian |
6 |
<5 |
|
Somalian |
6 |
8 |
|
American |
5 |
6 |
|
Ghanaian |
5 |
<5 |
|
South African |
5 |
<5 |
|
Spanish |
5 |
11 |
|
Sudanese |
5 |
<5 |
|
Albanian |
<5 |
8 |
|
Angolan |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Argentinian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Armenian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Bangladeshi |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Belorussian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Bolivian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Botswanan |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Bulgarian |
<5 |
9 |
|
Canadian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Central African Republic |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Chilean |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Chinese |
<5 |
15 |
|
Congolese |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Dutch |
<5 |
9 |
|
Egyptian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
El Salvadorian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Equatorial Guinean |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Eritrean |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Ethiopian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
French |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Georgian |
<5 |
12 |
|
German |
<5 |
6 |
|
Hondouran |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Hungarian |
<5 |
10 |
|
Iranian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Iraqi |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Italian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Ivory Coast |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Japanese |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Jordanian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Korean South |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Kosovon |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Kuwaiti |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Lebanese |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Lesothean |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Malawian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Malaysian |
<5 |
5 |
|
Mauritanian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Mauritius |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Mongolian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Nepalese |
<5 |
<5 |
|
New Zealander |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Niger |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Norwegian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Palestinian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Saudi |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Serbian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Sierra Leonean |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Slovenian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Swedish |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Syrian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Tanzanian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Trinidad & Tobago |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Tunisian |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Turkish |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Ugandan |
<5 |
<5 |
|
Vietnamese |
<5 |
5 |
|
Zambian |
<5 |
<5 |
*Note* Due to Statistical Disclosure Controls, any category with less than 5 prisoners will be replaced with "<5"