Heaven (A Prison Diary 3)

Will tells me that he won’t be returning to the States until after the appeal. He also reports that Godfrey Barker has had a change of heart and is no longer willing to help and may even leave the country rather than be forced to give evidence about the dinner party conversation that took place with Mr Justice Potts. His wife Anne has said she will divorce him if he does.19

8.00 pm

A lifer has absconded. He was out on an unaccompanied town visit and didn’t return for check-in by 7 pm. If he’s still absent in twenty-four hours’ time, the Home Office will release the name and his record to the press. When a young hooligan escapes, it rarely makes even the local paper, but the public has a right to know if a murderer is on the loose.

Doug fills me in on the background. It seems that the inmate failed an MDT (heroin) a few weeks ago and was moved out of the lifers’ unit back onto the north block. The result of his latest test last week is also expected to be positive. As this will be a second offence, he would automatically be transferred back to a B-cat, and have at least another eighteen months added to his sentence. This is a man who began with a twelve-year tariff, and has already served seventeen years.

If he’d been a model prisoner, he could have been released five years ago.

DAY 180

MONDAY 14 JANUARY 2002

9.00 am

When the doctor arrives each morning, he first signs the discharge papers of any prisoner due to be released. He then signs applications for a five-day leave, showing a clean bill of health. His next task is to see all the new prisoners who have just arrived from another jail. Finally, the doctor handles ‘nickings’: prisoners who have been put on a charge, and again must be passed fit both mentally and physically before punishment can be administered. Once all these inmates have been dealt with, the doctor moves onto the genuinely sick.

Today we have three ‘nickings’. Two are commonplace, but the third even took the governor by surprise. The first was for swearing at an officer, and that has to be pretty extreme for the prisoner to end up in front of the governor. The second was an inmate found to have £20 in his room. The first ended up with four days added to his sentence; the second seven days, but the third …

All prisoners out on town leave have to report back to the gate sober before 7 pm. This particular inmate was a few minutes late and was, to quote the gate officer, legless. Out there you can be breathalysed if you’re driving, in here we are when we’re walking.

When charged with being drunk, the prisoner claimed that he’d swallowed half a bottle of mouthwash thirty minutes before returning to the prison. It is true that a bottle of mouthwash contains alcohol, and it will register on the breathalyser at 0.5 per cent. The trouble was that the breathalyser was showing 3.5 per cent. Next, they checked his medical records, and as the prisoner had not visited the surgery for over a month, and never requested a mouthwash, he was asked to explain why he suddenly drank half a bottle.

‘Because I was giving my partner a blow job,’ he replied.

When the officer recovered from this revelation, he thumbed through the rule book and came up with a winner. ‘Did you sign the trust agreement for prisoners who are on a town visit?’ he asked innocently.

‘Yes,’ came back the immediate reply.

‘And who did you select as the person who would be responsible for you at all times?’

‘My mother,’ the prisoner replied.

‘And did your mother witness the action you have just described?’

The inmate paused for a moment, pleaded guilty, and had twenty-eight days added to his sentence.

11.00 am

Linda leaves the hospital and walks across to reception, where two prisoners have just been taken from their rooms without warning, as they are to be shipped out to Lincoln (B-cat). They have both failed an MDT and came up positive for heroin.

Prisoners are never given any warning they are on the move in case they decide to abscond rather than be transferred back to closed conditions.

DAY 181

TUESDAY 15 JANUARY 2002

9.00 am

The Derby Five are on the paper chase, and each of them comes to the hospital to say goodbye. Eamon, who shared a room with me for a short time, is particularly friendly and says he hopes we will meet again. I nod.

5.00 pm

Over supper I sit next to John (murder) who makes an interesting point about Chris (murder) who is still on the run. If he’s managed to escape

to certain European countries (Sweden, Portugal or Italy) whose governments do not approve of our tariff system for lifers, it’s possible that the authorities in that country may turn a blind eye, especially after the Home Office announced today that they did not consider Chris to be a danger to the public.

8.30 pm