Burke to face prison hearing over alleged abuse of staff
Jailed teacher due before Mountjoy governor
If he is found guilty he will lose some of the prison privileges MOUNTJOY SOURCE ON DISCIPLINARY HEARING
JAILED teacher Enoch Burke is to face a disciplinary hearing behind bars after complaints from prison officers.
He will appear before the Mountjoy Prison Governor Ray Murtagh after being accused of abusing warders at his High Court appearance over a week ago.
It is understood the P19 hearing, as it is known, will take place in the next few weeks. The chief prison officers and the staff involved will also attend.
The staff made the complaints after devout Christian Burke allegedly verbally abused them after his outburst in the chamber. There he had blasted the judge and the legal system over his jailing for contempt of court.
It is understood the incident happened when Judge Mark Sanfey ordered he be removed from court and warders tried to calm him down.
The judge was going to let him out of prison over Easter on condition he stay away from the Wilson Hospital School in Co Westmeath where he had been protesting.
He was prepared not to ask Burke to apologise for his contempt.
However, he changed his mind when the teacher refused to give the undertaking and verbally attacked the court
in a rant. Burke has now served more than 300 plus days in custody in the row over transgenderism and his refusal to refer to a pupil by a different pronoun.
He was jailed for contempt for breaching a High Court injunction to stay away from the school and he has repeatedly refused to do so and purge his contempt.
A Mountjoy source said: “Enoch is now facing a full disciplinary hearing.
“He will have the right to defend himself and give his side of the story.
“If he is found guilty he will lose some of the prison privileges that he has been receiving such as how many phone calls he is allowed a day, how many visitors a week he can receive, how many books he can get from the library.
“Enoch had been a model prisoner up until this incident and there was a lot of sympathy for him among the staff.
“There is a difference between a prisoner in contempt and someone who has committed an actual crime. He is very religious and people here respect that.”
Burke has been ordered to appear in court in June for a review of the case.
A spokesperson for the Irish Prison Service said it “does not comment on individual cases”.