6.01 am
Write for two hours. I’ve now completed 250,000 words since being incarcerated. Perhaps Alan Coren is right.
8.15 am
Ten new prisoners arrived yesterday. They will be seeing the doctor straight after breakfast before coming to SMU to be given their induction pack, and then be interviewed by the labour board. One by one they make an appearance. Some are cocky, know it all, seen it all, nothing to learn, while others are nervous and anxious, and full of desperate questions.
And then there’s Michael Keane (lifer, fourteen years so far, aged thirty-nine).
Those of you who’ve been paying attention for the past 250,000 words will recall my twenty days at Belmarsh, where I met William Keane on the tea-bag chain gang. His brother Michael has the same Irish charm, wit and love of literature, but never forget that all seven Keane brothers have been in jail at the same time, costing the taxpayer a million pounds a year. Michael passes on William’s best wishes, and adds that he heard today that his sister has just been released from Holloway after serving nine months for a string of credit-card crimes. Michael is hoping for parole in March, and if Irish charm were enough, he’d make it, but unfortunately, the decision has to be ratified by the Home Office, who will only read his files, and never see him face to face. His fame among the Keanes is legendary, because when he was at Belmarsh — a high-security prison — he got as far as the first outer gate while emptying dustbins. The furthest anyone has manage while trying to escape from hell.
10.20 am
A scruffy, unshaven prisoner called Potts checks into SMU to confirm that he has a meeting with his solicitor this afternoon. I check my day sheet to see that his lawyer is booked in for three o’clock. Potts, who has just come off a three-hour shift in the kitchen, smiles.
‘See you at three, Jeff.’
11.40 am
All ten inductees have been seen by the labour board, and are fixed up with jobs on the farm, in the kitchen or at the officers’ mess. One, Kevin (six years for avoiding paying VAT), has opted for full-time education as he’s in his final year of a law degree.
12 noon
Over lunch, Doug asks me if I’ve put in my takeaway order for the weekend. I realize I’m being set up, but happily play along. He then tells me the story of two previous inmates, Bruce and Roy, who were partners in crime.
Bruce quickly discovered that it was not only easy to abscond from NSC, but equally straightforward to return unobserved. So one night, he walked the six miles to Boston, purchased some fish and chips, stole a bicycle, rode back, hid the bike on the farm and went to bed. Thus began a thriving enterprise known as ‘weekend orders’. His room-mate Roy would spend the week taking orders from the other prisoners for supper on Saturday night (the last meal every day is at five o’clock, so you can be a bit peckish by nine). Armed with the orders, Bruce would then cycle into Boston immediately after the eight-fifteen roll-call, visit the local fish and chip shop, McDonalds or KFC — not to mention the pub — and arrive back within the hour so he could drop off his orders and still be seen roaming round the corridors long before the 10 pm roll-call.
This dot-con service ran successfully for several months, in the best traditions of free enterprise. Unfortunately, there’s always some dissatisfied customer who will grass, and one night two officers caught Bruce about a mile away from the prison, laden with food and drink. He was transferred to a C-cat the following morning. His room-mate Roy, aware it would only be a matter of days before he was implicated, absconded with all the cash and hasn’t been seen since.
2.50 pm
Potts returns to SMU for the meeting with his solicitor. He has shaved, washed his hair and is wearing a clean, well-ironed shirt, and his shoes are shining. I have the unenviable task of telling him that his solicitor rang a few moments ago to cancel the appointment.
This is a message to all solicitors and barristers who deal with the incarcerated: your visit can be the most important event of the week, if not the month, so don’t cancel lightly. Potts walks dejectedly back down the path, head bowed.
4.00 pm
Mr Hocking drops into SMU. He tells me that the whole of spur four on the north block (nine rooms) has just been searched, because an officer thought he heard a mobile phone ringing. Possession of a mobile phone is an offence that will ensure you are sent back to a C-cat the same day.
4.30 pm
Write for two hours, feel exhausted, but at least I no longer have to report for the 10 pm roll-call..
7.00 pm
I join Doug and Clive at the hospital. Clive tells me that the officers found nothing during this morning’s search. Often ‘hearing a mobile phone’ is just an excuse to carry one out when they are actually trying to find something else. Doug chips in, ‘Truth is, they were looking for another camera which the press have recently smuggled in. They even know the name of the prisoner involved, and as he’s due to be released on Friday, they want to be sure he doesn’t leave with a role of photos that would embarrass them.’
11.40 pm
Potts is rushed to Boston Hospital, having taken an overdose.
DAY 105
WEDNESDAY 31 OCTOBER 2001
6.23 am
I wake thinking about Potts. He reminds me how awful being incarcerated is, and why inmates forever live in hope. I later discover that Potts will be moved to Sudbury Prison, so that he can be near his wife and family. I know how he feels. I’m still waiting to hear from Spring Hill.
8.30 am
This morning we have a risk-assessment board. Four prisoners who are applying for early release on tag (HCD) are to appear before the deputy governor, Mr Leighton, and the senior probation officer, Mr Simpson. If a candidate has an unblemished record while in jail — never been put on a charge, never been involved with drugs — he is in with a chance. But the prime consideration is whether the prisoner is likely to reoffend. So if the inmate is in for burglary or credit-card fraud, his chances aren’t that good.
During the next hour I take each of the four prisoners up to face the board. They leave twenty minutes later, two with smiles on their faces who want to shake me by the hand, and two who barge past me, effing and blinding anyone who crosses their path.
11.11 am
Mr New has received a fax from Spring Hill, requesting three more documents and five more questions answered: a clearance release from the hospital to confirm I’m fit and well and not on any medication; my records from Belmarsh and Wayland to show I have never been put on report; and confirmation from NSC that I have not been put on a charge since I’ve been here. They also want to know if I intend to appeal against my sentence, and if so, will I be appearing in court. Mr New looks surprised when I say that I won’t. There are two reasons for my decision. I never wish to spend another minute of my life in Belmarsh, which is where they transfer you if you are due to appear at the High Court, and I’m damned if I’ll put my wife through the ordeal of facing the press outside the court as she arrives and departs.
11.30 am
At the hospital, sister checks over the forms from Spring Hill. Linda ticks all the little boxes and confirms I am remarkably fit – for my age, cheeky lady.
12 noon
Over lunch, Doug warns me that it still might be a couple of months before Spring Hill have a vacancy because it’s the most popular prison in Britain, and in any case, they may not enjoy the attendant publicity that I would attract. Bell (a gym orderly) leans across and informs me, ‘It’s the best nick I’ve ever been to. I only moved here to be closer to my wife.’
3.52 pm
Mr New reappears clutching my blameless record from Belmarsh and Wayland.
At 4.04 he faxes Spring Hill with the eight pages they requested. He receives confirmation that they arrived at 4.09 pm. I’ll keep you informed.
4.15 pm
The senior Listener, Brian (conspiracy to defraud an ostrich company), turns up at SMU. He asks if the backs of prisoners’ identity cards can be redesigned, a
s they currently advertise the Samaritans and Crimestoppers. Brian points out that as no prisoner can dial an 0800 number the space would be better used informing new arrivals about the Listeners’ scheme. He has a point.
5.00 pm
Write for two hours.
7.00 pm
Doug tells me that the governing governor, Mr Lewis, dropped into the hospital today as he’d read in the News of the World that I keep a secret store of chocolate biscuits in the fridge.
‘Quite right,’ Doug informed him, ‘Jeffrey buys them from the canteen every Thursday, and leaves a packet here for both of us which we have with my coffee and his Bovril.’
A week ago I told Linda that you could buy a jar of Marmite from the canteen, but not Bovril, which I much prefer. The following day a jar of Bovril appeared.
Prisoners break rules all the time, often without realizing it. Officers have to turn a blind eye; otherwise everyone would be on a charge every day of the week, and the prison service would grind to a halt. Of course there’s a difference between Bovril and beer, between having an extra towel and a mobile phone, or a hardback book and a tea bag full of heroin. Most officers accept this and use their common sense.
8.26 pm
Two officers, Mr Spencer and Mr Hayes, join us in the hospital for a coffee break. We learn that eleven new prisoners came in this evening, and only seven will be released tomorrow, so the prison is nearly full. They also add that another prisoner has been placed in the segregation cell overnight and will be up in front of the governor tomorrow. He’s likely to be on his way back to Lincoln Prison. It appears that a camera was found in his room, the third one in the past ten days. They also know which newspaper is involved.
DAY 106
THURSDAY 1 NOVEMBER 2001
6.19 am
In prison, you don’t think about what can be achieved long term; all thoughts are short term. When is the next canteen so I can buy another phonecard? Can I change my job? Will I be enhanced? Can I move into a single room? At the moment the only thought on my mind is, can I get to Spring Hill? Not when, can. In prison when will only happens after can has been achieved.
8.30 am
Fifteen new prisoners in today, among them a Major Willis, who is sixty-four. I look forward to finding out what he’s been up to.
Willis, Clarke (the cleaner) and myself do not have to work because we’re all over sixty. But Willis makes it clear he’s looking for a job, and the labour board allocate him to works (engineering).
9.30 am
Mr Hocking, the security officer, drops in for a cup of tea. He tells me that Braithwaite, who was found to have a camera in his room, is now on his way back to Lincoln. The newspaper involved was the Mail on Sunday. All the relevant papers have been sent to the local police, as an offence of aiding and abetting a prisoner may have been committed.
12.30 pm
I call Alison. Mary has been invited to Margaret and Denis Thatcher’s golden wedding anniversary on 13 December. James will be making the long journey to visit me on Saturday.
7.15 pm
Doug tells me that his contact in the administration office at Spring Hill isn’t sure if they’ll have me. I’ll bet that Doug finds out my fate long before any of the officers at NSC.
8.15 pm
A fight breaks out on spur six. It involves a tragic young man, who has been a heroin addict since the age of fourteen. He is due to be released tomorrow morning. Leaving ceremonies are common enough in prison, and an inmate’s popularity can be gauged by his fellow prisoners’ farewells on the night before he departs. This particular prisoner had a bucket of shit poured over his head, and his release papers burned in front of him. There’s a lookout posted at the end of the spur, and the nearest officer is in the unit office at the far end of the corridor, reading a paper, so you can be sure the humiliation will continue until he begins his right rounds.
When I return to the hospital, I tell Doug the name of the prisoner involved. He expresses no surprise, and simply adds, ‘That boy won’t see the other side of forty.’
10.30 pm
Returning to my room, I pass Alan (selling stolen goods) in the corridor. He asks if he can leave a small wooden rocking horse in my room, as his is a little overcrowded with two inmates. He paid £20 for the toy (a postal order sent by someone on the outside to the wife of the prisoner who made it). It’s a gift for his fourteen month old grandson.
As I write this diary, in front of me are several cards from well-wishers, a pottery model of the Old Vicarage, a photo of Mary and the boys and now a rocking horse.
Alan is due to be released in two weeks’ time, and when he leaves, no excrement will be poured over his head. The prisoners will line up to shake hands with this thoroughly decent man.
DAY 107
FRIDAY 2 NOVEMBER 2001
6.19 am
Absconding is a D-cat phenomenon. It’s almost impossible to escape from an A- or B-cat prison, and extremely difficult to do so even from a C-cat (Wayland, for example). In order for a prisoner to become eligible for D-cat status, he or she must be judged likely to complete their sentence without attempting to abscond. In practice, prisons are so overcrowded that C-cat establishments, which are desperate to empty their cells, often clear out prisoners who quite simply should not be sent to an open prison.
One intake of eleven such prisoners arrived from Lincoln last year and was down to seven before the final roll-call that night. I discovered today that because of the chronic shortage of staff, there are only five officers on duty at night, and two of them are on overtime, so absconding isn’t too difficult.
Prisoners abscond for a hundred and one different reasons, but mainly because of outside family pressures: a wife who is having an affair, a partner who takes the children away or a death in the family that doesn’t fulfil the criteria for compassionate leave. The true irony is that these prisoners are the ones mostly likely to be apprehended, because the first place they turn up at is the family abode and there waiting for them on the doorstep are a couple of local bobbies who then return them to closed conditions and a longer sentence.
Before I was sent to prison I would have said, ‘Quite right, too, it’s no more than they deserve.’ However, after 106 days of an intense learning curve I now realize that each individual has to be judged on his own merits. I accept that they have to be punished, but it rarely falls neatly into black or white territory.
Then there’s a completely different category of absconders – foreigners. They simply wish to get back to their country, aware that the British police have neither the time nor the resources to go looking for them.
For every Ronnie Biggs there are a hundred Ronnie Smalls.
Mr New tells me about two absconders who are part of North Sea Camp folklore. Some years ago Boston held a marathon in aid of a local cancer charity, and the selected route took the competitors across a public footpath running along the east side of the prison. One prisoner slipped out of the gym in his running kit, joined the passing athletes and has never been seen since.
The second story concerns a prisoner who had to make a court appearance on a second charge, while serving a six-year sentence for a previous conviction. When the jury returned to deliver their verdict, his guards were waiting for him downstairs in the cells. The jury delivered a verdict of not guilty on the second charge. The judge pronounced, ‘You are free to leave the court.’ And that’s exactly what he did.
The reason I raise this subject is because Potts, who’s had a bad week, absconded yesterday following his suicide attempt. It turns out that the final straw concerned the custody of his children – the subject he was going to raise with his solicitor.
8.15 am
After the frantic rush of events following the arrival of fifteen new prisoners yesterday, today is comparatively quiet. Allen (cannabis, six years) drops in to tell me that his weekend leave forms still haven’t been processed, and it’s this weekend. The duty officer Mr Hayes deals with it. Thomas (i
n charge of a gun that discharged) says his town visit form has not been authorized and asks how much longer he will have to wait to find out if he will be allowed out. Mr Hayes deals with it. Merry (embezzlement) arrives with still no word as to when Group 4 will be transporting him to Sudbury so that he can be nearer his family. Mr Hayes deals with it.
Mr Hayes is an unusual officer. He’s not frightened of making decisions and standing by them. He also makes his own tea. When I asked him why, he simply replied, ‘You’re not here to serve me, but to complete your sentence. I don’t need to be waited on.’
10.00 am
Mr Hocking and I agree it would be better for the press to take a photograph and then go away, leaving his little band of security officers to get on with their job.
I walk out of the SMU building and deliberately stop to chat to Peter (lifer, arson), who is sweeping leaves from the path. He keeps his back to the cameras. Three minutes later I return to the building and, true to form, the photographers all disappear.