The secret world of prison: Issue 1

The secret world of prison: Issue 1

This article raises the question whether the conduct of a member of the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) was too independent for the liking of the Home Secretary and now the Minister of Justice? The whole purpose of the independent is to display conduct which is independent of the Prison Service to ensure fair monitoring. Mr Ray Bewry was only doing his duty. It is a disgraceful state of affairs that he has, in effect, been punished for this; and that a prisoner has suffered an abuse as a result. In my experience, too many so-called independent members are merely rubber stamps for the system. Finding a member who takes the word independent literally is a rarity. I would argue that there should be more former prisoners upon the IMB. They would be less likely to have the wool pulled over their eyes.

Prisoner F was entitled by law to know the gist of why he was transferred backwards in the system from a category C medium secure prison to a category B high security prison. I know because I took the case to establish the legal point after I was subjected to a retrograde transfer. If you don't know the reason then you are unable to challenge it to determine whether the reason can be justified. The same applied for decategorisation decisions.

When I was sentenced the decision to sentence me to life imprisonment was largely based upon a secret document prepared by the prosecution based upon a Detective Inspector's gut instinct that I was in reality a serial killer. There was no other bodies and no other evidence, that did not appear to count for anything. Therefore, I had two prison records. The one kept in the prison and another at the Home Office. There was nothing in the prison record to justify my Category A status. The secret document was contained in the record at Prison Service HQ. This cost me 10 years extra in prison. It has yet to be justified. It is dangerous to rely upon unsubstantiated information in a situation where the liberty of the subject is at stake. Time for the crime was set at 15 years, time for nothing turned this into 25 years. Even allowing for the index offence, this was a miscarriage of justice. At the very least, reasons should be explained in the prison record and the gist of it passed on to the prisoner.
If the security of the state is an issue then there should be a notification that the information is contained elsewhere, and how it may be accessed if certain conditions guaranteeing security are met.

Before the IMB it was called the Board of Visitors, and I appeared before them charged with assault upon an officer. One member was new and started questioning in the spirit of impartiality and this so incensed the chairman that she adjourned and when the hearing resumed there was only two members instead of the legal requirement for 3 members to sit upon disciplinary hearings. And, I have come across a couple of members over the years who acted independently and they were deemed to be troublemakers by the prison authorities. I have read a psychologist's report which stated that I was challenging legitimately, however, because prison officers had negative feelings about this, therefore I needed to attend a Thinking Skills course to address my behaviour. It was the conduct of the prison officers which needed addressing.