HORRIFIC violence exploding inside Irish prisons will be shown for'the first time on Tv.

A new two-part documentary lifts the lid on life behind bars for the country's 4,000 prisoners.

Inmates are shown launching vicious attacks on prison CCTV and prisoners talk openly about the widespread violence that can erupt at any time, just from someone looking at another inmate the wrong way.
One 'man talks of how an inmate was dragged into a shower area with a bootlace round his neck and then slashed across the face requiring 180 stitches.
Hard-pressed prison officers reveal an arsenal of weapons,including a toothbrush with two razor blades attached to its head "because double blade wounds are harder to stitch up".

Murder

The public will see for the first time what doing time really means in Life on the Inside, starting tomorrow night on RTE One.Midas Productions _ gained unprecedented access inside Wheatfield Prison in Dublin and Shelton Abbey in Co. Wicklow, where they filmed over the course of a year.
Men convicted of murder, robbery and drug offences allowed cameras into their. cells to reveal how they ended up in jail and how it affects them and their families.
'In Wheatfield, which holds 700, inmates, 32-year-old Eddie has served eight years of a mandatory life sentence for killing his father.He says: "We are not all monsters. Some of us committed horrible crimes, but most are not horrible people. '

"Some things you have a chance to say sorry for, but sometimes you never get that chance and you have to live with that."
He said 'a life sentence meant there was no release date to aim for.
"We don't know how old our kids will be or who will be alive when we get out," he adds.

Father-of-three Colin (34), from Cork, says he has been in and out of jail for 18 years.
"I did not want to be a criminal but it turned out that way," he says. A former heroin user who turned to crime to feed his habit, Colin has been drug free for six months.
"I am keeping my head down and sticking to myself this time because I want to give my children a life. When I leave here I intend to make amends." Another inmate doing two-and-a-half years for fraud says he never asks prisoners what they are in for because he doesn't want to know.
"That could create tension. Even eye contact can start a row here," he explains.
The documentary follows Colin as he is transferred to open prison Shelton Abbey for good behaviour. At first he is hugely excited, but his mood soon changes.
"I am full of fear and anxiety going to a new prison and meeting new people," 'he confesses. "You come to a new prison and you don't want to put someone's nose out." . After his first night he says: "I would like to be in the other prison. I don't like it. I was out on the green last night and I had the urge to go home." "

A month later, though, he has settled and is determined to keep on the straight and narrow.

"I want to make it up to my children. I have taken knocks in my life but mostly generated by my own activities. I have spent my life blaming o,~hers but I can't hide any more, he says, •
One officer reveals some of the 115 inmates can't handle the free-dom of an open prison,
"There is nothing to stop you walking away except self discipline and willpower, It might be harder to do time," he explains, '

But another officer says he can see inmates' confidence growing the more trust they were given,
Another inmate, Michael, who was locked up after being caught with £340,000 of drugs for supply, says he had never done heroin until he came to prison.
"People say I will use it until I get out of here or until I get used to my sentence, but it doesn't end up like that," he reveals,His sister Cathy says she could not believe Shelton Abbey when she first saw it.

"Is this a- prison? He thinks it's hard, but he does not know how hard it is for everyone else as he does not have to worry about bills.
"I had to fight to go to college, but he gets all these courses handed to him. I have done nothing wrong, but I have to fight to do a course. All they are missing is their liberty."
Michael says someone could go to prison and learn nothing or do a course and try to make a living for themselves when they get out.

Another prisoner adds: "Anyone who thinks it's easy, it is not. Anyone with a family. You get one phone call a day and that's it."
• Life on the Inside, tomorrow 9.3Opm_