Three Seconds (72 page)

    FACT Most prison inmates are drug users. Anyone serving a prison sentence can continue to use drugs inside. A drug user who is released from prison having served their sentence often returns to crime in order to continue to feed their habit and to pay back drug-related debts incurred in prison.

    FICTION Aspsås prison does not exist.

    FACT Anyone who works with criminals knows that drug abuse is a major contributor to reoffending. Despite this, it is still possible to distribute drugs in high-security prisons by hiding amphetamines in bunches of yellow tulips that are sent to wardens, in the left-hand margin of hardback books from library stores, and in plastic bags stuffed down toilets using elastic bands and spoons. The Prison and Probation Service could-for
goodness sake, a prison is a closed system-stop
all drug supplies, but refrains from doing so.

    FICTION Lennart Oscarsson does not exist.

    FACT Drugs are effective in reducing anxiety levels and an amphetamine user who has had his fix will borrow a pile of porn magazines and disappear into his cell to masturbate. A prison system without drugs would therefore entail chaos and heightened anxiety and would thus put new demands on its staff. If prisoners were not high on chemical substances, the Prison and Probation Service would be forced to improve skills and competence at a cost that we, society, would not be prepared to pay.

    FICTION Martin Jacobson does not exist.

     With enormous gratitude to:

Billy, Kenta, C, R, and T,
who have served or are serving long sentences, who have lived longer inside than outside, who in this book, as in all our previous books, have provided us with the necessary knowledge, authenticity, and credibility to write about crime, whether it is about why forty degrees is not as good as fifty degrees when preparing tulips to be filled with amphetamine, or the necessary consistency for rubber to protect the stomach, or what a toilet outside a workshop in a maximum security prison looks like. Your trust strengthens our resolve to differentiate between bad people and bad actions.

The wise and courageous police officers
who have guided us through the extraordinary gray zone that unites police and criminals. Without you we would not have had the knowledge or legitimacy to describe in a novel how the work with covert human intelligence unravels the legal security that we others take for granted in a democracy.

For prison personnel-security, wardens, principal officers, and chief wardens-who,
when you have met us, have always helped, but who are caught between the ambition to try to do a good job and a system that forces you to reach for the scissors and cut your uniform into rags for cleaning the car.

Reine Adolfsson
for your expertise on explosives,
Janne Hedstrom
for your knowledge of forensic science,
Henrik Hjulstrom
for your expertise on snipers,
Henrik Lewenhagen
and
Lasse Lageren
for your medical knowledge,
Dorota Ziemiariska
because you speak better Polish than we do.

Fia Roslund
because you are there for us and the text throughout the writing process.

Niclas Breimar, Ewa Eiman, Mikael Nyman, Daniel Mattisson,
and
Emil Eiman-Roslund
for your extraordinarily wise opinions.

Niclas Salomonsson, Tor Jonasson, Catherine Mork, Szilvia Molnar,
and
Leyla Belle Drake
at Salomonsson Agency for your energy, competence, and presence here and abroad.