Young offenders thought likely to escape from custody will not be taken on supervised shopping and cinema trips from the juvenile detention centres at Lusk, Co Dublin. The ban is expected to last for the summer while a review of security at the centres is carried out for the Minister for Education, Mr Martin.
The Minister directed yesterday that the "mobility trips" are to be frozen for "high-risk" offenders, who have escaped before or are considered likely to do so.
He said the trips were a valuable part of the rehabilitative process but the safety of the public must be paramount.
The move follows the arrest yesterday morning of a 15-year-old Dublin youth, who escaped while on a shopping trip to Drogheda on Saturday. He had been on the trip with one staff member from Trinity House, Lusk, the secure unit of the Oberstown complex where he had been in custody.
Gardai arrested the boy shortly after 7.30 a.m at a house in Donamore, Tallaght. He was returned to Trinity House.
On Tuesday night gardai in Dundalk also arrested two teenage girls who had absconded from the Oberstown girls' centre on Monday. They were arrested by gardai searching the town after two women in their 70s were attacked and threatened with a pointed weapon by two girls.
Yesterday, Mr Martin met senior management from Trinity House and the boys' and girls' open detention centres at Oberstown.
He told them he was concerned about Saturday's escape and the fact that the offender was accompanied by only one staff member on the trip. He directed that a full review of security procedures be carried out. It is expected to be completed by the end of August.
The youth, who was recaptured yesterday morning, was interviewed at length in the Star newspaper yesterday, and shown proudly displaying a copy of an Irish Independent article which labelled him the "Young General", after the notorious Dublin criminal Martin Cahill, shot by the IRA in 1994.
"I have very major concerns about giving titles to young offenders, and branding them with adult crimes," the Minister said. "The danger is, he'll feel he has to live up to it".
It is not yet known how many of the approximately 80 offenders held in the three units of the complex will be regarded as "high risk" for the purposes of the ban, although it is likely that most will be among the 30 offenders in the secure Trinity House unit.
The complex's own figures indicate cases of absconding during such trips are rare. According to a survey compiled by the Oberstown and Trinity House management, there were only four cases of offenders absconding from 180 "mobility trips" allowed in the eight months to the end of last March.
Mr Martin said he also planned for research to be carried out into the value of the rehabilitative programmes at the centre. He considered it important to know how many offenders later ended up in custody elsewhere.