Debate contribution: Prisons: Compassionate Temporary Release
Debate contribution by Mrs Naomi Long on .
- MLA
- Mrs Naomi Long
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 28 September 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution (made as a minister)
- Business
- Oral Answers to Questions
- Heading
- Prisons: Compassionate Temporary Release
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5762063
Read the official Assembly record
Text
As you are aware, the two brothers are held separately because we believe them to be a bad influence on each other. Therefore, we believe that their being held separately is the appropriate way forward. It is of profound regret that, despite the fact that an intelligence-led operation in Magilligan last Tuesday secured the phone, removed it from Sean Anderson and placed it in police custody — the police are now investigating how it got into the prison, because, obviously, that is contraband; it is illegal to own a phone in the prison system — we do not know yet how the information that was on TikTok was posted. I am sure that Members have seen it. It taunted me, as Justice Minister, the family, the victims and, indeed, the victims of many other offenders who are held in Magilligan and were photographed with Sean Anderson. We do not know how it made its way on to TikTok, whether it had already been transferred to a different person or how that was done. However, the mobile phone is now in police hands. They are doing an investigation, and there may well be charges resulting from that. Certainly, adjudication arrangements for Sean Anderson have now been put in place in the prison system. The Member for Upper Bann rightly mentioned the impact of the matter on the family. It is not just the escape, which is hard enough; it is every mention of the case, every day. To see their brother Karol's face in the papers and on the news is traumatising. Therefore, I appreciate the sensitivity that Members have shown in asking their questions respectfully and when speaking to me, privately and in the Chamber, because I recognise that, every time it is reopened and discussed, it causes genuine harm.
300 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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