Other random items that I came across included packets of food not sold on the prison canteen list, books, notes from other prisons, jewellery and hair dye. Yup, fucken hair dye. Oh Lord, the vanity of some people.
There were also the occasional weapons smuggled through. While knives, ice picks and knuckle dusters were the most common, it wasn’t a surprise to see a gun coming through. These were extremely rare but happened none the less. It really reopened my eyes to where I was. I even saw a few stun guns come through.
But apart from all of the previous items, there was one that ruled above all else. Drugs. The bulk of any shipment would be the powders and the pills that took people to happy land. Everything was available, regardless of your taste. If you wanted it, we got it for you. And how the money rolled in.
9.
But while you might be thinking that is a lot of stuff to be coming in unseen through the front doors of a prison, the methods were even crazier. The most effective way, as you’ve probably seen in a lot of prison movies, are laundry trucks. That shit is actually true. I was dumbfounded when I saw the amount of shit wrapped up in a bed sheet, delivered as if the truck had ‘Postal Service” stencilled on the side instead of ‘JD Hillman Laundry Services’.
The amount of stuff that these guys brought in was unfathomable. It really was. Every trip would contain several bags of items and these fuckers entered the prison every single day except Sundays. And it was me that was sent out to help them, sometimes supervised, most times not. It depended on the screw on duty, most as laid back as Officer Friendly herself.
Then there were the bin guys. Not the garbage bins. The yellow bins with the funny symbols on them. The ‘hazardous waste’ truck came in 3 times a week and had contraband inside the fresh bins he brought in. It was my job to wheel the filled ones out and replace them with fresh ones. A job perfect for catching all the delicious parcels.
Next on the list were the ‘sanitary’ deliveries. This was the service that took care of all the ‘ladies’ special monthly needs’, if you catch my drift. Sanitary bins were dispersed throughout the jail, into every single building in the prison. Whilst it wasn’t my job to take them to those buildings, I did manage to get my hands on the ones in the medical unit. The rest were dispersed by the delivery guy himself, escorted by an allocated screw.
Contraband was also brought in via food delivery vehicles, but these I didn’t deal with. Kitchen billets took care of them. But it was via the meal trolleys that the freshly-acquired contraband was sent off to its allocated delivery point.
While all of these methods netted us a whole lot of contraband, there was one other way the stuff made it through. Officers. Crooked officers to be exact. They were on the payroll with us just as much as they were receiving payment from the prison itself. Some would have more than doubled, possibly even tripled their income by smuggling stuff in.
While some hid drugs and what-nots in their shoes, bags or even just pockets, others went the whole way, smuggling stuff through the front gates either in their arse or up their snatch if they had one. Officers like Jackie Friendly didn’t mind what they shoved up there, often bringing in enough dope to send an entire unit sky-high. Jackie even went as far as to hide more drugs under her ample breasts just so she could get extra cash.
Yup, we had a regular supply line into the jail and there was a tonne of shit coming through my fingers. Delivering the goods was almost as easy.
10.
While a lot of the contraband came through my unit, it also fell onto my shoulders to get it out of there just as quick. Having the shit lying around only increased the chances of me getting caught with it so I never delayed getting it out of there. There were a few methods I employed, all of which effective trade routes around the Palace.
Clancy still ran the kitchen supply line so I would throw a lot of the gear into empty meal trolleys before wheeling it back to the kitchen each meal time. The kitchen supplied lunch and dinner each day, giving me 2 round trips with which to move shit. I was usually greeted by Clancy himself who would then distribute the gear into the appropriate unit trolleys. It was like running a regular courier service.
Most of the screws didn’t really care about what we smuggled. A lot of them didn’t want the hassle of having to fill out a report and figured that if they didn’t see anything, they didn’t need to know anything. Not checking meant they wouldn’t find anything and hence remained in their stations most of the time.
There were the occasional gung-ho officers, but we knew who they were and when they were on. One of our own paid screws would be nearby as we passed, just to keep them distracted long enough for us to stroll safely by. It really worked a treat.
The other great way to move gear between units was via the librarian. This was a prisoner that worked in the library and delivered books to each unit twice a week. There were 2 crooks that regularly swapped
