Private prison staffing 'correct'

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The company running Scotland's only private jail will review the case of an inmate murdered by a fellow prisoner, but said there was no staff shortage.

David Martin, 20, kicked and stamped on Michael Cameron and poured boiling water over his head, in an attack captured on CCTV.

A prison officer and a nurse witnessed the attack, but the warder could not intervene until reinforcements arrived.

Prison operator Serco told BBC Scotland that staff took the correct action.

At the High Court in Glasgow on Thursday, Martin, on remand for murder at the time of the prison incident, admitted murdering Cameron.

We cannot guarantee that there will never be any violent incidents Michael ClarkeSerco

Another prisoner, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was involved on the attack on Cameron on 16 June, 2006.

The victim was on remand at the time of the attack, which took place in a four-bed cell in Kilmarnock Prison's health care wing.

Serco spokesman Michael Clarke told the BBC's Good Morning Scotland programme that Kilmarnock was a "safe" prison.

"It is, however, holding some violent and unpredictable men," he said.

Lessons learned

"Although we do as much as we possibly can to minimise the chances of violence in the prison, given the nature of the people we are looking after there, we cannot guarantee that there will never be any violent incidents."

Mr Clarke added: "You wouldn't have enough staff everywhere in the prison to deal with anything breaking out anywhere, because the prison is quiet at night and there was an unprovoked, unforeseeable attack in the health care unit.

"Staff were called from other parts of the prison and arrived very quickly."

The attack happened in the prison's healthcare wing

The incident, he added, would be looked at again and assessment procedures on the supply of kettles to prisoners reviewed, to see if lessons could be learned.

But Mr Clarke insisted: "We believe our staff did the right thing and the staffing levels were correct.

"I think we are going to look again at out risk assessment procedures. The way we allocate prisoners together and make sure that we are doing absolutely everything we can to minimise the chances of something as horrific as this happening."

Prison protocol dictates three custody officers should restrain any one prisoner.

The murder happened three months after Martin was remanded for the murder of his mother's former boyfriend, Gilbert Grierson, 46, in Irvine, in March 2006.

He admitted a lesser charge of culpable homicide by killing Grierson with knives, scissors, a frying pan and a bottle and then setting his home on fire.