The papers are full of stories about the model Naomi Campbell, who has been awarded £3,500 against the Daily Mirror and its then editor, Piers Morgan, for breaching her privacy. However, the judge also states that she had deliberately lied when in the witness box.
Norman Tebbitt has asked through the press if she will be tried for perjury, or do these laws only apply to Conservative politicians?
4.00 pm
Mr Belford comes to the hospital clutching the results of my MDT. (See opposite.)
6.00 pm
Peter (arson, set fire to a police station) has so far served thirty-one years; you may recall that I earlier reported his first town visit. This morning, two officers arrived outside his room and took him down to the segregation cells, which can only mean one thing: he’s going to be shipped out to a closed prison today.
I suspect that one trip to Boston will be the last time he ever sees the outside world.
When I first came to NSC some months ago, Peter swept the main road that runs from the gate through to the office block; some 300 yards away. With a six-foot-four-inch frame, Peter had a presence you could not easily avoid, but zero social skills, and thirty-one years in prison (twenty-eight of them behind bars) ensured that it was never going to be easy for him to settle.
Every morning he would break away from his sweeping and open car doors for members of the female staff. He would then engage them in long conversations. Harmless enough, you may say, but several of the younger girls felt harassed and didn’t complain for fear it might harm Peter’s parole prospects. Unfortunately, these episodes continued, despite several warnings from officers. Governor Berlyn, who is in charge of the lifers, was left with little choice but to take action to allay the staff’s fears.
He took Peter off his job as a road sweeper and asked him to be a reception orderly. Peter made the tea and helped officers with minor tasks. It was beyond him. He lasted a fortnight. They next moved Peter to the officers’ mess, to assist with cleaning and occasional serving. He lasted ten days before being transferred to the farm as a shepherd, where he survived less than a week before being sent to the kitchen. This was no more successful, and he has ended up in segregation prior to being moved back to the B-cat.
Peter is in his sixties, and has no hope of returning to a D-cat in under five years, if ever. This case highlights a bigger issue. Don’t we have some duty to a human being other than to lock him up for the rest of his life? Peter failed to come to terms with the system, so the system has failed him.
When I am eventually released, I am going to be asked so many questions to which I do not know the answer.
DAY 257
MONDAY 1 APRIL 2002
10.30 am
I listen to an announcement over the tannoy.
‘Anyone wanting to assist with the special needs group trip to Skegness, please report to the bus at the front gate.’ The word ‘please’ should have given it away. Prison officers rarely, if ever, say please. However, two inmates still report to the gate in the hope of boarding the non-existent bus to Skegness.
The April Fool prank played on me took a different form. Mr Hewitt, the head of the works department, purchased a jigsaw puzzle of the House of Lords at a car-boot sale, and told me he expected me to finish it by the end of the week as part of my anger management programme.
It took me two hours just to finish the border. I intend to draft in all the members of Club Hospital to assist me with this 1,000-piece monster.
DAY 262
SATURDAY 6 APRIL 2002
Dr Susan Edwards, Reader of Law at Buckingham University, has completed her independent study showing the harshness of my four-year sentence.28
Jeffrey Archer, former deputy chairman of the Conservative party and best-selling author, was convicted of perjury and perverting the course of justice arising from a libel action over whether he spent a particular night with a Monica Coghlan, for which, following a ‘not guilty’ plea, he received a prison sentence of four years. As Jeffrey Archer’s prison sentence is the longest passed in any case of civil perjury and the sentence length is comparable to prison sentences passed in the gravest cases of criminal perjury including murder and police corruption it requires some rather more detailed consideration.
Gilbert Gray QC has already warned Mary that he’ll be able to predict the outcome of my appeal as soon as he knows the make-up of the three-judge panel. What a dreadful condemnation of British justice – that my future will not be decided on whether I’m innocent or guilty, but on who judges me.
DAY 205
TUESDAY 9 APRIL 2002
NSC, like most prisons in Britain, is badly understaffed. We have over 200 inmates, and only 27 full-time officers, meaning that there are never more than 12 officers on duty at any one time. The following advertisement appears in several local papers every week, and elicits few replies. (See overleaf.)
I’m told it’s no different for any of the other 137 prisons in Britain. It’s hardly an appealing career, other than for the truly dedicated believers in justice – or someone not quite tall enough to get into the police force.
DAY 268
FRIDAY 12 APRIL 2002