Heaven (A Prison Diary 3)

12 noon Lunch.

12.40 pm Phone Alison at the penthouse, and collect my mail from south unit office.

1.00-3.00 pm Continue second draft of yesterday’s work.

3.00-4.00 pm Check in arrivals from other prisons. Give short introductory talk, then take their blood pressure and weight, and carry out diabetes test (urine).

4.30-4.50 pm Evening surgery. Those inmates who ordered prescriptions this morning can pick them up as they’ll have been collected from a chemist in Boston during the afternoon.

4.50 pm Linda leaves for the day.

5.00 pm Supper.

5.30-7.00 pm Final writing session, totalling nearly six hours in all.

7.00 pm Unlock the end room for use by outside personnel, e.g. Listeners, Jehovah’s Witnesses, drug and alcohol counselling sessions and prison committees.

7.10-8.00 pm Read through the day’s mail, make annotated notes and post to Alison.

8.00-10.00 pm Doug and Carl join me for a coffee, to chat or watch a film on TV.

10.30 pm Read until I feel sleepy.

The hospital orderly has the longest and most irregular hours of any prisoner. It’s seven days a week. On Saturday and Sunday after Linda and Gail have left I sweep the hospital ward, lobby, lavatory and bathroom before mopping throughout. (Although I can’t remember when I last did any domestic chores, I find the work therapeutic. I wouldn’t, however, go so far as saying I enjoy it.)

I then check my supplies, and restock the cupboards. If I’m short of anything, I make out an order form for the stores (memo pads, lavatory paper and today for a new vacuum cleaner – the old one has finally given up).

Some prisoners tell me that they would rather work in the kitchen or the officers’ mess because they get more food. I’d rather be in the hospital, and have a bath and a good night’s sleep.

DAY 184

FRIDAY 18 JANUARY 2002

5.26 am

The night security guard has just walked in and tells me with a smile that I can abscond. I put my pen down and ask why.

‘We’ve got one too many on the manifest.’

‘How did that happen?’ I ask.

‘A lad who was released yesterday arrived home and no one wanted him, so he crept back in last night and dossed down in his old room.’

‘So what did you do?’ I ask.

‘Marched him back to the gate and threw him out for a second time.’

I feel sorry for a man who has nowhere to go, and can only wonder how long it will be before he reoffends.

8.00 am

I bump into Keith (‘knowingly concerned’ with a class B drug) on his way back from breakfast. He must still be waiting for his missing papers to be signed before they can release him. You _ might be – as I was – puzzled by what his charge means.

Keith ran a small transport company, and one of his lorries had been fitted with spare fuel tanks. When the driver came through customs, the spare fuel tanks were found to contain 249 kilos of marijuana. Keith was sentenced to nine years.

Whenever a judge passes a sentence on drugs, there’s a tariff according to the class of the drug – A, B or C. Also relevant is whether you are considered to be ‘in possession of’ or a supplier, and the amount involved.

Drugs’ classification: