Heaven: A Prison Diary (31 page)

Blossom has
already shaved off the beard.

The other
interesting piece of information to come out of Blossom’s visit to the High
Court was that three cannabis dealers had their sentences halved from seven to
three and a half years.
A sign of things to come?

Blossom comes
in to see sister. He’s in a dreadful state. His wife has written to let him
know that his oldest son (aged twenty-nine) is on heroin. He asks me to fill
out a form so that he can apply for compassionate leave.

He tells me
that he’s already got hold of a pair of handcuffs and he plans to chain the boy
to a water pipe until he comes off the drug. He’s quite serious.

Linda tells him
firmly that his plan is
neither legal or
practical,
nor of much value to his son.

Blossom has
been granted two days compassionate leave. He is such a strange mixture of high
moral values and low life. He’s quite happy to steal caravans and cars, which
has been the reason for several of his family ending up in prison, but is
devastated when he discovers his son is on heroin. This is a man who has been
married for thirty-six years, has eleven children and countless grandchildren,
and until now, none of his offspring has ever been involved in drugs.

My visitors
today are Ed Streator, the former US minister to the Court of St James’s and
later American ambassador to NATO, and Quentin Davies MP, who is currently
Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

The ninety
minutes fly by, as both men have so much to tell me about what’s happening
where you all are.

I had forgotten
that Quentin was PPS to Kenneth Baker when he was Home Secretary. During that
period, he developed strong views on the reform of our penal system after
becoming aware of the drug problem both inside and outside of prison. He talks
with refreshing frankness and honesty about both subjects.

Ed adds a view
from the other side of the Atlantic, and when we debate smoking cannabis he
reminds me that California has recently passed a law to prevent anyone under
the age of twenty-one purchasing tobacco, let alone cannabis. In fact, he adds,
in California it’s virtually illegal to smoke anywhere except in your own home.
Quentin suggests that if tobacco was discovered today, cigarettes would be
illegal – possession two years, tobacconists five years.

Stephen is the
latest member to join Club Hospital (Sundays, 4 pm to 6 pm). He’s currently
serving a two-year sentence for theft, perverting the course of justice and
false accounting. But there are several twists.

He is a former
captain in the Adjutant General’s Corps, and after being court-martialled, was
sent to Colchester Prison (an army establishment) for the first month. But
because his sentence was more than twentyeight days, he was automatically
transferred into the prison system to complete his term.

And now for the
second twist. A European Court ruling has recently determined that the armed
forces disciplinary system is invalid, and all prisoners serving a sentence
resulting from a court martial must be released.

Not only might
Stephen be set free, but he will also be entitled to £60,000 in compensation,
as well as being reinstated as a captain. Our masters in The Hague have decided
that you should not be arrested, charged, tried and convicted
by your peers.

Stephen tells
me that there are 600 such prisoners currently in British jails, and he hopes
to learn the outcome of this ruling in the next few weeks.

The final twist
– just before he was arrested, Stephen received a letter from his commanding
officer to tell him that he was being considered for promotion to major.

A man comes
into surgery
whom
I despise.

Drink drivers
are the staple diet of NSC. Of the 220 prisoners currently resident, around 20
per cent have been sentenced with driving offences. Sadly, Tony is not
untypical.

Tony is in his
early fifties, the father of five children by four women. He currently lives
with another woman on a caravan park in Scunthorpe. He pleaded guilty to his
latest
charge,
of driving whilst being disqualified
and uninsured (surely the time has come for all motorists to display – as they
do in France – an insurance disc, as well as a road fund licence). For this,
his latest offence, Tony was sentenced to twelve months, which in real terms
means that if he is granted a tagging facility, he will be released after four.

Now here is the
rub: during the past twenty years, he has been charged with twelve similar
offences, and sent to jail on seven separate occasions. He’s been banned from
driving for four years, and happily tells anyone who will listen that as soon
as they release him he’ll be back behind the wheel.

It gets worse.
He’s currently employed by a local garage as a second-hand car dealer, and
therefore has access to a variety of vehicles, and admits he likes to get
‘tanked-up’ at the pub across the road once he’s closed a sale.

He displays no
remorse, and has no fear of returning to prison. He considers NSC to provide a
slightly higher standard of living than the one he currently enjoys on a
Scunthorpe caravan park.

Perhaps the
time has come to change the offence for those who are regularly convicted of
drink driving to one of ‘potential manslaughter’, carrying with it a custodial
sentence of four years in a closed prison, and treat such people like any other
violent criminals.

Alison tells me
that the BBC has been in touch about a programme on best-selling authors called
Reading the Decades
. While accepting
the fact that I can’t appear on camera, they ask if I could do a telephone
interview. They already have contributions from King, Grisham, Le Carre,
Forsyth, Cooper and Rowling. I ask Governor Leighton for a view, and he says
that he’ll seek advice from the Home Office.
27

Mr Beaumont
sent a circular to all the officers at NSC a few days before he arrived which I
obtained recently. It gives you a flavour of the man. (See opposite.) I can’t
believe his secretary ever checked the piece for grammatical mistakes. Even an
eleven-yearold would have spotted the error in the last line. I can’t wait to
meet him.

Gail rushes in,
slightly flushed. She’s been door-stepped by a woman from the
News of the World
who has discovered
(from an inmate) that she’s leaving NSC to take up another post. The journalist
is looking for stories and asked, ‘Are you leaving because of Archer?’

Gail replied
that I am working as a hospital orderly, and that I take the job very
seriously, am popular with both the officers and the other prisoners and am
learning about drugs and their relevance in prison. Gail innocently asked how
much they would pay for a story, to which the journalist replied a couple of
thousand pounds – more if it was a big story that would show Archer in a bad
light.

I am called in
for a voluntary drugs test. You can refuse, but should you do so your
privileges – town visits, canteen cash and weekend leave – are likely to be
rescinded. I discover that two prisoners have come up positive, one for
amphetamines, the other for cannabis.

By the end of
the morning, that number had risen to five; all will appear in front of the
governor for adjudication tomorrow.

An officer
comes into the hospital and tells me that he once worked on the sex offenders’
unit at Whitemoor Prison and he could tell me enough stories to fill another
volume.

‘Give me an
example,’ I ask, topping up his coffee.

He pauses for a
moment. ‘We once had a young prisoner on B block who used to keep a budgerigar
in his cell, and the little bird became the most important thing in his life.

Another
prisoner living on the same wing, sensing the lad’s vulnerability, threatened
to kill the budgie unless he gave him a blow job.

The prisoner
reluctantly agreed. Within days, the first prisoner had become a
prostitute,
and the second his pimp. The pimp would charge
two phonecards for the prisoner to give a blow job and three to be buggered.
The pimp ended up making a hundred pounds a week, and the budgie survived. That
was until an inmate grassed on him in the hope that the pimp would be
transferred to another prison and he could take over his lucrative position.
Both prisoners were moved to separate establishments the following day.

That morning
the budgie was strangled.’

Governor Berlyn
comes to the hospital this morning and tells me that despite his efforts, I
will not be allowed to accompany Mark Le Sage whenever he addesses school on
the problem of drugs. The governor of HMP

Stocken has
told Mr Le Sage that he will not permit such excursions even if an NSC security
officer accompanies me.

The nation is
currently in the grip of a massive drug epidemic, with children of twelve being
offered heroin in our playgrounds. As part of my rehabilitation, I have
volunteered to visit schools in the Lincolnshire area and talk to them about
the problem. To date I have had assistance from the local police drug squad,
the Lincolnshire education authority and the medical team at NSC, lead by Dr
Walling. So I can only wonder why the governor of Stocken would want to stop such
a worthwhile project.

Perhaps the
Home Office knows the answer?

It’s been a
week for visitors: last Sunday, Henry Togna and David Watson, Monday, Gilly
Gray QC, Wednesday, Lords Hayhoe and Denham – Bertie, my old Chief Whip.

So now I’m up
to date on the Lords reform bill, foxhunting and the state of Margaret
Thatcher’s health. Not to mention the euro, and when the planned referendum
might or might not be.

I put an idea
to Bertie on the Lords reform bill, when to my horror he withdrew from an
inside pocket, a small memo recorder. I glance over to the desk to see the duty
officers chatting to each other. I was relieved when Bertie put the recorder
back in his pocket. We don’t need another member of the House of Lords as a
resident of North Sea Camp.

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?

Mr Belford
comes to the hospital clutching the results of my MDT. (See opposite.)

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-fourinch
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.