Heaven

I can’t believe how stupid some people can be.

On Monday I attended a CARAT meeting where one of the participants told everyone present that he had given up drugs. On Tuesday the same man comes up in front of the governor for failing an MDT for cannabis. Seven days were added to his sentence, and he told me he considered himself lucky not to be shipped out. Last night the same man was caught on his way back from Boston in possession of a plastic bag full of drugs that included cannabis and heroin. He was locked up in the segregation cell overnight, and will be shipped out this morning to a B-cat with a further twenty-one days added to his sentence.

His stupidity is not the only aspect of this incident worth considering. If he’d been caught with such an assignment of drugs ‘on the out’ he would have been sentenced to at least seven years, but as his sentence is already fourteen, he gets away with twenty-one days added. It’s just another pointer to the drugs problem this country is currently facing.

11.00 am

Mary has a piece in Peterborough that she came across on the Web. It makes me laugh so much it’s simply better to reproduce it rather than attempt any precis. (See below.)

Woman of substance

Lady Archer’s sense of humour is alive and well. The fragrant chemist has just submitted a “hazardous materials data sheet” to the Chemistry at Cambridge newsletter. “Element: woman. Symbol: Wo. Discoverer: Adam. Atomic mass: accepted as 55kg but known to vary from 45kg to 225kg. Occurrence: found in large quantities in urban areas, with trace elements in outlying regions. Physical properties: boils at absolutely nothing, freezes for no apparent reason. Melts if given special treatment, bitter if used incorrectly. Chemical properties: affinity to gold, silver, platinum and all precious stones. The most powerful money-reducing agent known to man. Common use: highly ornamental, especially in sports cars. Can be a very effective cleaning agent. Hazards: highly dangerous except in experienced hands. Illegal to possess more than one, although several can be maintained at different locations as long as specimens do not come into direct contact with each other.”

The Telegraph also publishes the results of a poll on Mr Blunkett’s recent pronouncements that non-violent, first-offence prisoners should be able, where possible, to continue their work while reporting into jails in the evenings and at weekends; 83 per cent say ‘keep them locked up’, while only 12 per cent feel the Home Secretary is right to consider legislation along these more realistic lines. I must confess that before I’d been to prison, I would have been among the 83 per cent.

7.00 pm

I phone Mary, who tells me before I can get beyond ‘Hello’ that Baroness Nicholson has finally issued a statement in which she offers a grudging apology. (See below.)

Baroness Nicholson wishes to make it quite clear that at no time did she intend to suggest that Lord Archer had personally misappropriated money raised by the Simple Truth appeal. Indeed, it had not occurred to her to think that it might have been possible for Lord Archer to gain access to funds raised by the British Red Cross. If tho inference was drawn that she was accusing Lord Archer of having stolen Simple Truth money from the British Red Cross, she regrets the misunderstanding and regrets any upset that may have been caused to Lord Archer’s family.

DAY 204 THURSDAY 7 FEBRUARY 2002

9.00 am

Mr Berlyn strides in at a brisk pace. After a few minutes ensconced with sister in her office, he emerges to tell me that the Home Office has issued an ‘overcrowding’ draft, as all the prisons in the north of England are fully occupied. Result: we will be getting ten new inmates today, and will be ‘surplus to our manifest’ of 213. Here at NSC we are already seeing those overcrowding statistics translated into reality.

Mr Berlyn has directed that two inmates will have to be billeted in the hospital overnight. I fear I will be experiencing a lot of this during the next few weeks, and I may without warning have to share heaven with some other sinners. However, as six inmates are being released tomorrow, this might be only temporary.

12.07 pm

Linda and Gail charge out of the hospital carrying an oxygen cylinder and two first-aid boxes. All I’m told is that a staff member has fallen off a ladder. On the intercom it’s announced that all security officers must report to the south block immediately. It’s like being back in an A-cat where this was a daily occurrence. Prisoners tell me that in Nottingham ambulances were more common than Black Marias.

A few minutes later Linda and Gail return with a shaven-headed officer covered in blood. It seems that he leaned back while climbing a ladder and overbalanced, landing on the concrete below. No prisoner was involved.

I quickly discover that a small head wound can spurt so much blood that it appears far worse than it is. When Linda has finished cleaning up her patient and I’ve given him a cup of tea (only the English), he’s smiling and making light of the whole episode. But Linda still wants to dispatch him to the Pilgrim Hospital for stitches to the scalp wound, and both she as hospital sister, and Mr Hocking, head of security, have to fill in countless forms, showing that no prisoner was responsible.

6.00 pm

I read another chapter of Street Drugs, this time to learn more about crack cocaine, its properties and its consequences. It’s quite difficult not to accept the argument that some young people, having experimented with one drug and got a kick out of it, might wish to progress to another, simply to discover if the sensation is even more exciting.

10.00 pm

Only one of the extra two inmates allocated to spend the night in the hospital appears at my door, a blanket and sheet under his arm. It seems they found a bed for the other arrival. He’s very quiet, despite the fact that he’s being released tomorrow. He slips into bed and simply says, ‘Goodnight, Jeff.’

Am I that frightening?

DAY 205 FRIDAY 8 FEBRUARY 2002

5.30 am

‘What do you think you’re doing, you fucking dickhead?’

I’m about to explain to my overnight companion that I write for a couple of hours every morning, but when I turn to face him, I realize he’s still fast asleep. It’s the first occasion someone’s sworn in front of me for a long time, even in their sleep, and it brings back memories of Belmarsh and Wayland. I continue writing until seven, when I have to wake him.

‘Morning, Jeff,’ he says.

By the time I emerged from the bathroom, he’s disappeared – his sheets and pillowcases folded neatly at the end of the bed. By now he’ll be in reception, signing his discharge papers, and by eight-thirty will be on his way, a free man. [22]

2.00 pm

Our two new inductees today are somewhat unusual, and not just because they’re both lifers (we now have 23 lifers out of 210 occupants). The first one tells me that he’s been in jail for twenty-three years and he’s only thirty- nine. The second one limps into the hospital and spends a considerable time with sister behind closed doors.

Later, when I take his blood pressure and check his weight, he tells me that he’s already served fourteen years,