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CORRUPTION BEHIND CLOSED DOORS

It is acknowledged that there are more than 70,000 people languishing in British gaols not counting prisoners on remand or awaiting trial and ignoring those who are being held in the “Interests” of national security [often on the orders of the home office] and discounting those held by the immigration service awaiting deportation. For the most part the 70,000 inmates of the gaols are tried and convicted criminals “Doing time” because they were caught and the case against them held together long enough to secure a conviction. To many of them a “Stretch” is an occupational penalty that is accepted as a hazard of their chosen path in life.
On arrival at a penal establishment they are “Processed”, which usually means that their personal freedom is restricted, personal possessions are taken from them and they are allocated a “Cell” often shared with several other prisoners. To be fair to the prison service some care is taken to ensure that the placement of a prisoner is “Appropriate” but it is not always possible to obtain the ideal because a growing penal population overcrowds most prisons. Food, shelter, accommodation and discipline of a sort is assured for the duration of their stay at “Her Majesty’s pleasure” but it is possible for them to obtain some extra’s within the legal framework of the prison system.

There are however illegal means of procurement within the system and a recent report highlighted some but by no means all of what an inmate could obtain if he or indeed she had sufficient funds to make it happen. There are two hierarchies in a prison one is plainly visible and holds the keys to everything, it comes in a uniform and is clearly discernable from the other and its “Boss” is the governor. The other is not so visible and requires a great deal of observation to determine its structure it is the chain of survival that an inmate encounters when he enters the world of penal servitude. Inside a prison there are “Barons”, people who can and do control the black economy of a gaol where almost anything is available at a price. The “Rackets” include the supply of phone cards, tobacco, drugs, alcohol, and all manner of contraband that is normally forbidden to prisoners. The supply routes for this illicit procurement often includes members of the prison staff, either by direct involvement or by an intentional myopia brought about by the supply of cash. The problem is not widespread among prison officers but it is present and a small minority have undermined prison discipline to the point where the Home Office has been forced to investigate.

So how does it happen, how do a population of criminals serving time corrupt the moral fortitude of those who hold the keys.

Most of the time it begins with a kindness some small service that an officer could perform at no risk for an inmate that the officer may have come to know slightly better than usual. Someone who has access to both sides of the wall could carry a message across the high walls of a prison. It would probably emanate from some family circumstance that the officer feels would set the prisoners mind at rest and in the long view help the inmate to do his time. It would begin as a freely given act of humanity perhaps but it can evolve into something much more. After a while the prisoner might suggest that there is money to be made from such a venture, no risk easy money for services rendered, services, which are or have already been provided.
The officer now finds himself between the proverbial rock and a hard place, he has already broken the rules by carrying the message and he knows that a word from the prisoner in the right quarter would bring a retribution that would result in his downfall. So what does he do? Maybe his thinking includes the premise that if he continues to carry messages he can at least control the information going out but that depends upon the messages being just that innocent messages and not trigger codes for illegal activities beyond the walls. The alternative is to loose everything so reluctantly he agrees. Payment may come in many guises, from the unsolicited brown envelope in the post, to the resolution of a difficult interpersonal problem that is miraculously resolved by person or persons unknown. The deal is struck and the postmaster [prisoner] now has a postman [prison officer] but having taken an “Inducement once” he cannot refuse future requests from the same quarter and is now upon the downward slope to corruption. Soon uncensored mail, mobile phones, special telegrams are added to the available services.
The scenario is fictitious but the chain of events has happened inside some prisons and a minority of officers have taken the money. Once they step across the line it never ends. They are set to control criminals but those who handle pitch are sometimes defiled by it and we really should not be that surprised if a prison officer who is not that well paid decides to augment his income. The majority of prison officers are as honest as the day is long and would not compromise their position of trust but some inexperienced officers at the mercies of hardened criminals have succumbed to the coercion of some inmates. Yet one inmate that had served his time claims that he did corrupt a prison officer who received more than £35,000 in payment for services rendered and is “Still in post”.

In most prisons it is mainly a financial arrangement and whilst it is blatantly illegal it is normally confined to a small circle of conspiracy. However there have been cases where a remand prisoner was able to direct his lieutenants outside the prison to ensure an acceptable outcome at their trial. One of these cases involved five men on remand for a brutal gun attack who tried everything possible to undermine evidence at their trial including intimidation, death threats and arson. The trial took place in Leicester; it had to be moved from another major city because the influence of the accused was so great that the outcome was in serious jeopardy. Witnesses at the trial were given unprecedented protection and though the majority were found guilty the appeal courts have been in session several times to examine the outcome. If these prisoners had access to mobile phones then the result would have almost certainly involved the deaths of several witnesses.

Though the two scenarios are at opposite ends of the scale they both began in the same way, the investigation branch of the prison service call it “An inappropriate relationship” which covers a multitude of sins but at the end of the day it involves the corruption of a person placed in a position of trust. The Home office recently reported that there were many such cases, prison governors admit that such things do happen and some say that as many as ten cases are currently under investigation in their own particular facility.

Pentonville prison in London recently brought charges against fourteen officers for having inappropriate relationships whilst two other London prisons say that several cases are currently being investigated.

Whilst it could be accepted that this sort of coercion could take place and one element of the conspiracy is unlikely to be moved until their sentence is served the question posed by circumstance is “Could prison officers be seconded to other locations on a temporary basis”? That would, at least reduce the risks and possibly protect both the prison officers and the system.

This week the Home Office announced that some prisoners may be freed earlier than their sentence tariff dictated, the reason given was the acute overcrowding of the prisons. The prison service maintain that they only have room for another seven hundred inmates, most prisons cater for 500-700 inmates but it is known that in some establishments the cells already hold twice the number of inmates that they were designed for. It is important that cells are populated in relation to the offences committed e.g. “Short term lesser offenders should not find themselves sharing cells with long term serious offenders” in order that prisons do not become universities of crime breeding ever more dangerous offenders.

If the prisons are as overcrowded as the service would have us believe is it any surprise that inappropriate relationships begin? On both sides of the cell door it is most likely the easiest way to survive. Why have Home Office budgets been frozen for two years if the prisons are in such dire need of reform? Where will we put the prisoners that are now being sentenced not only for domestic crime but international terrorism? If the prisons are at bursting point now how can we continue to use them as a tool of retribution if we are no longer prepared to invest in them, we cannot have “Law and order” and expect the prisons to cope. The prison service maintains that if 700 more prisoners are sent to them next week they would be full. That is to say that today they are within 1% of absolute overload. Can anyone feign surprise that there is corruption in our prisons?

JP.

Posted: August 16, 2006

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