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Peterhead prison inmates tore up toilets, phones, and table football in rampage

The inside of HMP Grampian; where prisoners will play bingo and take part in quizzes.
The inside of HMP Grampian; where prisoners will play bingo and take part in quizzes.

Drunken inmates at Scotland’s newest jail caused £150,000 of damage during a shocking 14-hour rampage.

CCTV cameras, toilets, payphones and a table football game were among the catalogue of equipment, furniture and fittings smashed up during a tense stand-off between prisoners and staff at HMP Grampian.

The repair bill – obtained by the Press and Journal – includes the cost of fixing damaged cells, windows, floors and doors.

More than 40 inmates barricaded themselves inside the jail’s Ellon Hall just weeks after the £140million complex in Peterhead was opened.

Today, the Press and Journal can reveal details of what happened during the overnight fracas, which led to 40 specialist prison warders being drafted in from units across the country.

Offenders caused more than £16,000 of damage to cell doors, including breaking spy glasses and glazing, and a further £13,395 damage to flooring.

CCTV units and a fire alarm system were also destroyed and will have to be replaced at a cost of almost £10,000.

Prison chiefs will also have to spend more than £12,600 replacing part of a toilet unit and nearly £12,000 on repainting.

A servery, including a utensils cabinet and roller door, was also extensively damaged to the tune of more than £15,000.

Smashed windows will cost nearly £8,000 to replace and the prison service has been left with a £12,055 bill for electrical and plumbing work.

It is estimated that inmates caused as much as £10,000 of damage to the hall’s ventilation system and a further £8,000 of damage to a pool table and table football game.

Cell and room numbers will also have to be replaced, as will shower doors worth nearly £3,400.

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) could face further costs as the investigation into the disturbance is ongoing.

A spokesman said: “A complete record of all of the items damaged is not yet available, as a full assessment of the areas affected is still ongoing.”

All inmates involved in the incident have since been moved to other prisons, including Perth and Barlinnie in Glasgow.

As a precaution, prison bosses transferred all young offenders to Polmont, near Falkirk, amid fears that they, too, could be tempted to go on a copycat rampage.

Sources at the jail said the stand-off was the result of a power struggle among offenders, with some vying for the “top dog” position. Officers said it was expected at all new-build prisons for inmates to test the boundaries.

The prison, which replaced HMP Peterhead and Craiginches in Aberdeen, currently holds about 200 male and female inmates.

The building was designed with rehabilitation rather than punishment in mind, although it has extensive security features.

The SPS spokesman added: “The Ellon Hall remains out of bounds while the investigation is ongoing. We are still running with a reduced prison population.”

It is understood that prisoners were high on their own home-made hooch – a concoction of stale bread and fruit juice – when they used sheets and bedding to barricade themselves into the cell block.

The incident began at 8pm on May 13 and ended at 10.30am the following day, when prison staff stormed the barricaded area.

The disturbance was classed as a level-three incident and was the first of its kind in Scotland for about six years.

It happened weeks after the Press and Journal revealed there had been at least two flare-ups between staff and inmates – as well as an assault in the visiting area – since the jail opened in March.

Last night, Peterhead councillor Alan Buchan said: “The problem is that the prison service has taken far too relaxed an approach from day one. They’re treating it like a holiday camp.

“They’re going to spend all this money replacing these fixtures and fittings, but there doesn’t seem to be anything stopping prisoners from doing this all over again.”

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