An investigation is under way at a high security prison in Co Antrim following the death of an inmate.
John Anthony Deery, a 50-year-old convicted sex offender, died in the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast yesterday after being found hanging in a cell.
The incident happened in the medical centre at Maghaberry Prison, near Lisburn, on Thursday night.
The incident comes a year after another prisoner, Colin Bell, hanged himself in the jail.
Recently the prison's monitoring procedures were criticised in an inspectors' report.
In 2003, Deery was jailed after admitting indecently assaulting five girls between 1975 and 2002.
He had been released on conditions and had only recently returned to Maghaberry after breaching a custody probation order.
His death is sure to prompt fresh questions for Prisons' minister Paul Goggins and Northern Ireland Prison Service director Sir Robin Masefield, both of whom pledged to improve suicide monitoring practices in the jail in the wake of Bell's hanging.
The Northern Ireland Office said the Prisoner Ombudsman has begun an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the death.
Police have also been informed.
In a separate incident at the medical centre two hours earlier on Thursday night, another prisoner suffered a heart attack.
The inmate, in his 70s, was transferred to Lagan Valley hospital in Lisburn.
