On my way through the system I noticed many things that seemed at odds with what I had assumed prison to be about. An in vogue phrase at the moment seems to be “a dumping ground for society” and this is pretty much on the money. I had always thought that prison was where dangerous people were kept. People who were a danger to others and to society. In Scrubs there were many people who fit this mould, although whether they were really like this on the out or just putting on an act so as to be left alone only they and their friends and family will know. But one image that has stayed with me to this day was a *stereotype alert* Pakistani shopkeeper who, as it turned out, was in for V.A.T fraud. He was utterly lost. When I went to court for sentencing he was one of the people I shared the cell with. The C.P.S alleged he had swindled £500,000 over ten years. And they made it sound like this was a major crime. The reality was that the money had gone on bills. He hadn’t bought a new Porsche or a Rolex, he had just been trying to make ends meet and try to give his family a future. After we’d spent a day in the court cells chatting I’d see him around on the wing. More often than not he wouldn’t even notice me. The poor bloke was so spun out. It seemed then, and even more so now in light of the financial crisis, so petty. No one had been hurt, for all intents and purposes it was a victimless crime. But to H.M Customs and Revenue he was a dangerous criminal. They could have made him pay back the money and do community service but they wanted to scare small business people into not fucking with them. I never did meet any Vodafone chief execs while I was away. Or from any major company’s, It’s like there are two laws for different sized company’s.
While I was on C wing there was a bloke in the cell opposite mine who I used to occasionally chat to. He was in for breaking a restraining order. After his lady had sacked him he had lost the plot a little bit. Not in a violent way, more a pathetic irritating kind of way. You know, the phoning up at all hours, crying down the phone, professing undying love and “How could you do this to meeeee, I LOVE YOU!!!!”. She got the restraining order after he started turning up at her work trying to talk to her. He was, at that point, convinced he could win her back. Actually Even when I met him inside he still thought there was a chance. Anyway, my point is that he wasn’t dangerous he just needed help to realise that it was over. He got arrested, when, one day he went to her house to see her. After knocking on her door and realising that she wasn’t at home he decided to wait for her. He sat on the kerb opposite and waited. She didn’t come home, she was on a two-week holiday. The Police, however, had been called by the next door neighbor and duly came around to arrest him. He was on remand when I met him. His doctor had sent letters to the court and to the prison explaining that he needed to be in a psychiatric hospital and not on 23 hour bang up. During the three weeks that I knew him he often cut himself. Almost every other night the cell alarm would go off in the cell he shared with a variety of people due to them getting sketched out by him cutting himself up. The week that I was transferred to A wing I woke up to screaming coming from the cell across the landing, his cell. The next day i saw his cell mate and asked him what had happened. He told me he’d woken up (he was on the bottom bunk) to see matey hanging from the top of the top bunk. He had managed to raise the alarm in time but that was more luck than anything else. At night the Screws often disappear from the wing. It wasn’t as though the prison hadn’t been warned. He shouldn’t have been there.
I don’t know the stats but from experience a large percentage of prisoners have mental health problems.
Bullying is a constant problem in every walk of life. At work, in relationships, in social circles, having been through it myself I can see it happening all to often. In prison it is fucking dangerous. If you have experience of bullying then you’ll know how horrifying it is. If you then add not being able to get away from the person, actually being locked up with them, it is a terrifying thought. In The Verne there was a chap who had come in after me. He was in for money laundering and was apparently an accountant on the out. As soon as he came in he was trying to find out who was in for smuggling, he wanted to do a deal. This kind of person is best avoided, they make themselves a target and if one get to be known as an associate then one could also become a target. This chap had approached me and many others, he was really trying to pretend to be something he wasn’t and it all came on top. He approached another prisoner who wasn’t as tolerant. Prisoner#2 got prisoner#1 talkingabout how much he wanted to spend, to gauge if he really did have money or whether he was the worst undercover cop ever. One evening prisoner#2 walked into prisoner#1’s room picked up a letter from his wife and walked off with it. Five minutes later he came in and told prisoner#1 “I have your wife’s address, I want £1000 put into my prison account and £1000 put into *****’s (his mate) account otherwise the house will be torched. Prisoner#1 was freaking. Five days later he came back from a phone call white as a sheet (he was asian, that’s how shook up he was). His wife had come home after work to find two milk bottles half full of petrol on her doorstep. There was nothing he could do, he couldn’t protect her where he was. He couldn’t get the prison to do anything. And worst of all, he only had himself to blame. There are some really fucking bad people in prison, that’s why they are there. If you get noticed too much you may as well paint a fucking big target on your back. Never boast unless you can, and will, back it up. If you walk around telling people how well off you are, you should expect someone to try to take it off you. I don’t know if he payed up or not. I would assume that he did. But if so it wouldn’t have ended there. once they have you paying up they won’t stop and it won’t stop until you get transferred out. And even then not always, I kept in touch with some of my friends after being transferred and I have heard stories of people on long sentences having networks in different prisons.
It’s not about rehabilitation. I though it was before I arrived. It is about retribution. I can tell this by the way the governors treated us. Most Screws were o.k they just wanted to get through their shift with the least amount of hassle. A few thought that their job was to punish us, as if having our liberty taken wasn’t punishment enough. These were the Screws to avoid, don’t ask them for anything. If they tell you to do something just do it, if you complain about it you’ll be on a charge. Don’t give them any excuse. Some were sticklers for the rules, but at least you know where you stand. And some were just inept, these are dangerous in a place like Scrubs and normally find there place where they can cause the least amount of damage. But the governors and the probation workers inside the prison (a completely different kind than the outside type). One look and you can tell they don’t believe the rehabilitation line. It is not possible to afford to rehabilitate 83000 people on the budget HM prisons are run on. I was in Scrubs on over the illegal prison officers strike. The first we heard of it was when I switched on the t.v in the morning and my cell mate (who was a local lad) said “That’s the front gate!” And there were all the Screws milling about outside. for 48 hours we were locked up. Our meals were bought to our cells by the governors. There was no exercise or association, there was hardly anyone on the wings. I believe there was a death in Pentoville and I know there was at least one attempt in Scrubs. While they were striking about money and so didn’t get much sympathy the point that should have been concentrated on was that it can’t go on like this. Reoffending rates are high, on my release I didn’t even have an address to go to. For the two months leading up to my release I had been asked by probation where I was going and every time I simply said “I don’t know” considering on release I’d still have 18 months of probation to do you’d think they might have made a bit more effort to help. I was released with £40 and a plastic HMP bag with all my kit in. You can’t just throw people onto the street with just a couple of quid in their pocket and expect things to be fine. For those that have family and or friends, for those who have a house or money to come out to, they may be ok but if you have nothing then you will do what ever you have to do to survive. If people are given a direction and a start in life then their chances of living the straight life is improved. The problem is that too many people see it as rewarding bad behaviour, without thinking how shit their lives may have been before then. I have been told many times in my life “you get out what you put in” or “you reap what you sow”. If society leaves the people who are already struggling on the edge to fend for themselves, if society put nothing in to these people, what does it expect to get back from them.
I’ will be back on course in a few days. I have to work!!! 🙂 C
destressed.life 