19-year-old British woman at the Co-ed Facility in January, are no longer on Police bail.

And The Royal Gazette has learned that Prison Officers Association president Lynn Hall has requested that the officers be reinstated immediately.

The men were suspended in mid-March, pending the Police investigation into the alleged incident. According to Mr. Hall, they were released from bail on June 16 but are still not back on the job.

"It's time to put them back to work,'' Mr. Hall yesterday told The Royal Gazette : Pointing out there are staff shortages at the prisons, he held the sooner they are back on board, the better.

Mr. Hall revealed he has made a formal application to Prisons Commissioner Edward Dyer to have the officers reinstated immediately.

That application, he noted, was made soon after the three men were released from bail.

According to Mr. Hall, Mr. Dyer is waiting for a report from the Attorney General's Chambers before he decides whether to reinstate the men.

"I am hoping that that comes very soon,'' Mr. Hall said. "It's long overdue for these men to get back to work.'' Meanwhile the 19-year-old woman is serving out the remainder of her six-year sentence at Holloway Prison in London. She was convicted in 1997 for smuggling $66,000 worth of heroin into Bermuda in her underwear.

News of the prison officers' release from bail was not welcomed by the mother of the alleged victim who is adamant that her daughter was raped.

"I'm very upset at this news and I'm very disgusted with the Bermuda authorities,'' she said from her London home.

Vowing that "this is not the end of it'', the angry mother said a "radical'' group has contacted her and are interested in taking on her daughter's case.

While she would not divulge the name of the group, she said: "I'm not letting it go. I'll fight them to the end.'' "My daughter was raped in there I'm sure,'' she said. "She is not doing well at all now. She is traumatised and at a very low ebb. She has met authorities here who believe her statement.'' The mother also hit out against lawyer Mark Pettingill who represented her daughter while she was at the Co-ed Facility.

"He never returned any of my phone calls once he became a senator,'' she said. "And I think he owes my daughter and me, an apology. He never wrote to me.'' But Mr. Pettingill rejected her complaints.

"I did everything within my power that I was instructed to do,'' he said. "I ensured that a Police investigation was launched and that she was repatriated to Britain.

"I am a little disappointed that I did not get a thank you card,'' he added.

The mother's anger only softened when she spoke of the Bermuda Police Service.

"They were the only ones who sided with my daughter,'' she said. "I applaud the Bermuda Police Service for trying to investigate this case.'' Last night, a Police spokesman said the file was expected to be sent to the Attorney General's Chambers for a decision on whether charges will be laid.