Heaven Read online

  Mr Downs sighs, phones for a taxi, and instructs an officer to travel with the inmate to Pilgrim Hospital (cost £20).

  That means tonight we have 191 prisoners being guarded by four officers – one of them a young woman who’s recently joined the service.

  Good night.

  DAY 182

  WEDNESDAY 16 JANUARY 2002

  10.00 am

  Martin, the inmate who lost two months for attempting to steal some prison clothes on the morning he was due to be released, has had another twenty-five days added to his sentence, this time for being caught with marijuana in his room. He was originally due to leave NSC on 14 December, and now he won’t be released until 14 March. At this rate I might even get out before him.

  It’s not uncommon for inmates to end up serving a longer period than their original sentence. However it will take Martin a number of ‘knock backs’ before he can beat a prisoner in Wayland (A Prison Diary, Volume II) who started with a three-year sentence for possession of heroin and is still a resident of that establishment eight years later.

  3.00 pm

  Among the new inductees are a policeman and a man who was sentenced to five years for attempting to kill his mother-in-law. The rest are in for the usual tariff – burglary, driving offences, drugs, drugs and drugs. Still, I sense one or two stories among this lot.

  7.00 pm

  I have a visit from Keith (class B drugs), which is a bit of a surprise as he was on the paper chase last Monday, and should have been discharged yesterday. I can’t believe he’s committed another crime in the last twenty-four hours. No. It turns out that the parole board, having informed the prison that he could be released on Monday, have now told him he must wait until one or two more pieces of paper are signed. Why couldn’t they tell him that last Monday rather than unnecessarily raise his hopes?

  I tell Keith about a prisoner who was transferred from Leicester yesterday and is being returned to that prison today. The authorities forgot to send all his parole details. The man travelled to NSC in a sweat box, spent the night here, and now has to go back to Leicester Prison. By the way, we expect him to return to NSC next week. This bureaucratic incompetence will be paid for out of taxpayers’ money.

  DAY 183

  THURSDAY 17 JANUARY 2002

  After a month of being hospital orderly, I have my work schedule mastered.

  5.00-7.00 am Write first draft of previous day’s events.

  7.00-7.30 am Draw curtains, make bed, put on kettle, shave, bathe and dress.

  Prepare lists and make coffee for Linda – dash of milk, one sweetener.

  7.30-8.00 am Surgery, usually twenty to thirty inmates who collect prescriptions or need to make an appointment to see the doctor at nine.

  8.00-8.30 am Deliver slips for absentees from work to the farm, the works, stores, mess, education department, north and south blocks and the gate.

  8.30-8.45 am Breakfast in the dining room.

  9.00-10.30 am Doctor’s surgery.

  11.00 am Acupuncture, usually three or four inmates.

  11.10-11.40 am Read this morning’s draft of this diary.

  11.50 am Wake up patients having acupuncture; Linda

  removes needles.

  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:

  Class A heroin, ecstasy, cocaine, opiates

  Class B cannabis (marijuana) (now Class C), amphetamines

  Class C anabolic steroids, keratin, amyl nitrite (poppers)

  Here’s a rough guide to the maximum penalties:

  Class A possession, seven years supplier, life (fine or both) (fine or both)

  Class B possession, five years supplier, fourteen years

  Class C possession, two years supplier, five years

  Many of the inmates feel unjustly treated when sentences can vary so much from court to court, and as over 50 per cent of prisoners are in on drug-related charges, comparisons are made all the time. A few admit to having got off lightly, while most feel hard done by.

  5.00 pm

  The man who was sentenced to five years for attempting to murder his mother-in-law turns out to be another unusual case. This particular inmate hit his mother-in-law when she refused to allow him access to visit his children. She collapsed and was taken to hospital. As she didn’t die, and the police didn’t have proof that he intended to murder her, the charge was dropped to aggravated burglary and he was sentenced to five years. It would take a trained legal mind to understand how the second charge came about. The prisoner explains that when he went in search of his children, he entered his mother-in-law’s house when she had not invited him in – and this offence is aggravated burglary.

  DAY 185

  SATURDAY 19 JANUARY 2002

  2.00 pm

&n