The number of suicides in jail has risen to a record level, and the Christmas period usually sees an increase in such self-inflicted deaths.
Many inmates who kill themselves are held at local prisons, which often suffer from overcrowding. These prisons house inmates on remand and immediately after sentence. The majority of suicide victims in prison are remand prisoners awaiting trial.
Manchester Prison had seven suicides in 1999, the worst record, compared with five at Leeds and four at both Brixton and Leicester.
The director of the Howard League, Frances Crook, said, ‘Despite the best efforts of many prison staff, the prison experience continues to prove unbearable for many who are sent there.’ Ms Crook went on to say that the prison system was failing to provide decent, humane care.
The Director General of the Prison Service, Martin Narey, said he was ‘deeply concerned’ about the rise in suicides and pledged that reversing it was the ‘top priority’ for prisons. Key areas for improvement include screening inmates quickly to identify those at risk as soon as they come into prison, when many suicides happen, and devoting more resources to relieving the pressure on local prisons.
Mr Narey has also ordered the end of the use of bare strip cells as holding rooms for suicidal inmates. He added that a large number of people coming into prison already had a lot of problems, including mental disorders.
Sir David Ramsbotham, when he was the Prisons Inspector, said the number of suicides was due to a management failure to implement the correct measures.
‘The guts of this problem is prison service management, which is not managing the suicide problem in a proper way with people responsible [for it] up and down the system. In my view, area managers should be responsible for checking that suicide procedures are really being conducted properly. What is more, I would also make them sign a certificate to say that they have done so — so that they can be held accountable.’ Too right, mate, too right!
Privately run Doncaster Prison was awarded a Charter Mark by the then Home Secretary, Jack Straw, when it had the worst suicide record in England and Wales!
And someone who’s managed to add a couple of extra victims to the statistics is big fat Fred Lowe — what a nutter! He killed two cons, one in Gartree Prison and one in Long Lartin. The one in Gartree he did with a pair of scissors; he just lost the plot and went mad. Covered in blood, he walked out of the con’s cell and shouted, ‘One off.’ But if the truth were known, Fred Lowe is a fucking cowardly piece of filth. He refused to come to my trial to give evidence for me; he tells people he couldn’t, but it’s shit, he refused to come. Now here’s a guy who’s never going to get out and he’s too frightened to come to court to help me, but he’s all right with killing cons! Why kill his fellow cons?
It’s a fact of life that most con killers are bullies; they take their frustrations out on them ’cos it’s too much for them to do a screw.
I cried when young Tommy Hole hanged himself on M-Wing in Parkhurst. Old Tom, his dad, was the one to find him. Imagine that, a father walking into his son’s cell to find him hanging off the bars. Tommy was serving nine years. Old Tom was serving 24 years for blags, a true East End family, loyal as they come, from Canning Town. Salt of the earth people! Let me tell you now, I have seen it all; I have felt the coldness and emptiness. But this tragedy had to be one of the coldest days of my life; it had a bad effect on my mind.
The day it happened I was in the box. I’d chinned a screw a couple of days before. But when I came out of that box, I could smell the depression in that jail; every con in Parkhurst was on a low, it was a sad occasion. Old Tom actually went mad and was later sent to Rampton. He could not get his son out of his mind. That same day, they were to have a visit together with their family. Imagine Tom having to go on that visit to say, ‘Young Tom’s dead.’ This is the reality of life in jail — it’s madness! Why did he do it? He had just 18 months left to serve; he was fit, strong and he had a wife and kids, why top himself? Who knows why … it does your head in trying to think why.
In later years, Tommy got out and remarried. He fought his way back out of the coldness and was doing well, then … Bang! Some cunt blew a hole in his head in a crowded pub! But I knew Tom well and that’s how he would have wanted to go. Personally, I don’t think he ever got over young Tom, three-quarters of him died with his son that cold day in Parkhurst.
Barry Rundean was another sad suicide; we all cried — hardcore men just in shock. Why? A top-class man can’t just top himself for no reason! Barry cut his throat and wrists, bled to death in his cell in Long Lartin. He was a fit man in his late 20s; a lifer, we all loved him to bits, a number-one guy. I used to train with him; nobody could do sit-ups like that man did. Fucking awesome! I can’t work it out, I never could, but it blows a hole right through me, it’s madness.
Dessy Cunningham was another one. Hanged himself in Whitemoor, a good blagger, a top villain. He spent a good ten years fighting this piss-hole of a system; a lot of those years were spent in solitary, but he survived it all. Then he has a year left to go and he dies! When cunts like Fred West do it we have a party, but when our own do it, then it fucking hurts. We don’t stop hurting; it lingers on and on and on; it’s for real.
You’d be amazed at the number of murders in jail over the last 30 years. Most of them are just heated moments that get out of hand; a blade goes in and lights switch off … permanently! But any con thinking about it, I’d advise them not to ’cos you’ll be looking at 30 years. You may kill him, but you’ll be killing yourself at the same time; con killers rarely get released. I don’t know of any who got out in the last 30 years … oh, sorry, some did, in a body bag!
Barry Prosser may not mean a lot to people in the free world, other than to his family; neither will George Wilkinson or Michael Martin, and all the other poor souls who died in custody, in ‘mysterious’ circumstances. Go and research prison deaths in the last 30 years; who says there is no death sentence?
They may not hang us but they choke us, punch and kick us to death, drug us, suffocate us. Let’s take Barry Prosser, a big man, 6ft 3in tall and 17st; he wasn’t a real criminal, more a disturbed giant than anything else. His body was a mass of bruises his spleen had been completely ruptured, and he was found dead in a hospital cell in Winston Green.
A doctor’s report actually said he did it himself! Come on, let’s get real here; it’s gone on since the beginning of time. At times, a crowd of screws just lose control, bash us a little too hard; one may squeeze the neck just that little bit too much or crush a skull off a wall just once too often and it’s all over. But is it? Why is it few or none get life for murder; how do they escape it? Simple! The system covers for such atrocities, and they all stick together.
‘Prosser was mad … he just threw himself off the walls … he was suicidal …’ What a fucking load of shit! Wake up and smell the shit! ’Cos Joe Public is eating shit, fed by shit people! The system is corrupt and rotten right through, but only guys like me remember the Barry Prossers of the world. I can’t forget it. It’s like with you sane people outside: you remember John Lennon or JFK; it sticks in your mind. But every time I’m jumped on and taken to the box and bashed up, I see Barry Prosser in my head. I picture George Wilkinson. I feel the ghosts of shame.
Vince Powell was one dangerous fucker. In the ’70s at Parkhurst, he was on the garden party and he buried a shovel in another con’s skull; rumour had it that it was over a half ounce of tobacco. To kill a man for half an ounce of ‘bacca’ is just beyond belief, but that’s prison madness! They moved Powell to Winchester to await trial; weeks later, a screw opened his door to let him out for exercise and he was hanging; many say he didn’t do it, one of many iffy suicides.
Billy Kringle was one of the maddest cons I ever came across. Billy shot a cop in the ’70s; he was on home leave at the time, shot him six times. He always claimed it was a hair-trigger, funny that … six times! Anyway, Billy actually escaped off the special unit in Parkhurst, but sadly they got him four hours later in the woods.
I last saw Billy up in Full Sutton; by then he had done a good 25 years, but it wasn’t the same old Billy. He seemed distant, like he was in a dream. One day, he just said out of the blue, ‘Chas, do you believe in little people?’
‘What? Little people? What, midgets?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘the little elves!’
I looked at him and saw madness all over his face.
‘I’ve seen one, Chas, an elf!’
‘I’ll see you later, Bill,’ I said.
Phew! It was soon after that he was found dead in his cell. His heart gave up on him. Insanity drove him mad! It’s never nice to see, but it’s worse watching the body bag come. Sad. I wonder if the little people have body bags?
They reckon that two-fifths of women prisoners and a fifth of male prisoners in England and Wales have attempted suicide, according to official statistics. Now I’m not one for rattling off facts and figures, but these figures aren’t from me, they’re from what you call the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Now it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to work out that suicide rates in prison are on the increase, especially when the prison population is rising. Naturally, there is a strong link between social deprivation, mental ill health and imprisonment. Another survey also found that prisoners in England and Wales have very high rates of mental illness, substance misuse and personality disorder – see, I told you we were all mad!
Do you know that all these fancy groups like MIND, NACRO and the Howard League for Penal Reform were all written to a few years ago on my behalf asking for help? What a waste of time they all are and you lot keep sending them money … Are you mad? Send the money to me instead!
A few years back, in December 2000, the Dangerous and Severe Personality Disorder Act was passed through the British government to become law in England and Wales. Sounds OK, but do you know what it means? ‘A small group of people who are very seriously disordered and who pose a very high risk to the public.’ This group are ‘dangerous, severely personality disordered people’ (DSPD), meaning that an order could be obtained for the indefinite detention in a specialist unit for DSPD. Do you know what it will mean? It will mean that prisons and asylums will become full of psychopaths – you will see the murder and suicide rate rise if this happens. Like I said, you cannot ever cure madness; tame it, yes, but never cure it.
You’ll be amazed how many murders are committed in our prisons and asylums. Just to put you in the picture, 28 cons have been murdered in the prison system in the last 12 years, and that’s not counting asylums. I personally know of at least 20 murders in which cons have killed fellow cons. Why did they do it? Hate, jealousy, anger, madness … call it what you will, but people die over madness.
When Fred Lowe killed his first con in Long Lartin, he did it because he was serving life for a robbery and violence. He made it clear to the authorities, ‘I’m not serving life for fuck all.’ So he got some scissors and hacked a con. He stabbed him 58 times. He was a human teabag.
When Bob Maudsley killed two cons in one day he ate part of the brains from one of the cons. Why? When Doug Wakefield killed Brian Peak in Parkhurst, he first garrotted him with a bootlace and, when he was dead, he set about stabbing him. No need, as he was dead.
When Danny Blanchflower killed the works screw he used a hammer. He battered in the man’s skull so badly he was unrecognisable. This is what prison madness is all about! It’s out of control. Some of those murdered were nothing less than liberties. They picked on the weak.
My question is … why have they all killed cons (apart from an isolated incident with a works screw), why not the screws or the governors or the sadistic doctors? Why do they go for the soft option — their own kind? Are they killing themselves by killing another con? Or is it war? Are cons at war with cons? The answer is an emphatic YES!
We fucking despise paedophiles, rapists and grasses. Dirty scum! We don’t want to live with shit. So, at times, there are bodies, but half of these murders are totally unnecessary. Some of those dead men were diamonds, never deserving to die.
Maidstone — Kessen killed a fellow con. Bashed in his skull with a bed leg. (A lovers’ tiff.) God, you’ve gotta see it to believe it. Killers. Would-be killers watching the prison yards, searching for a victim. ‘Who can I kill today?’ Just like nutters in the street betting their friends that they can knock this one or that one out with one punch.
It’s fucking madness at its very best. Some of these killers are 10st, soaking wet, but with a 7in piece of Sheffield steel they are ruthless. And when it’s pushed into the back of a 20st giant, it’s over. You can’t always survive such an attack. Some do — I did myself — many others have, but most go out in body bags.
Prison killers are totally cold and ruthless. I must add that the odd few had no choice but to kill. It’s kill or be killed. But when a big strong guy goes into a weaker guy and kills him just for the sake of it, I call it out of order. When a con stabbed another over a pork chop, I call that fucking insanity, senseless. When Bob ate the brain, I call that crazy. Fuck me, the food ain’t that bad. When Cheeseman and Maudsley killed Alan Francis in Broadmoor, I call that a cowardly act of senselessness. But if it’s a paedophile or grass, I say well done, kill some more of them.
I almost joined those killers twice — once in Rampton, and once in Broadmoor. When I was in Rampton, I did actually kill him by strangling him, but would you believe, the screws brought him back to life; he was clinically dead. The shit had raped and killed a young kid, so they saved a monster. But looking back on it I’d sooner blind the fucker than kill him. Let them live on in darkness. Imagine living in the asylum or prison ’blind’. At that time, though, I was heavily medicated and, looking back on it, I wasn’t in control of myself.
Who’s gonna bash in your skull in an asylum? You just don’t know. Now that’s worse than death. It’s a living hell. Insanity at its very best. Don’t kill them, blind them. Snap their spine, put them in a chair. Let them wheel around the jail in total blackness. We could jump out and punch them as they pass. Throw soaking balls at them, darts. We could create games with them. That would lend a purpose to life. To keep us amused. Killing the scum is too good.
So what causes men to become violent? I’ll tell you — boredom, silly rules, muggy screws and pathetic governors. What else can we do? Swallow it, wipe our mouths out? You have to fight for your rights, not sit back and take it. If some mug outside tried to mug me off, I’d put him in his place, not in a hole, just simple guidance. I’ve learned the hard way. When screws treat me decent, I act decent. Treat me bad and I’m badder than them.
Violence leads to madness; it fills you with crazy thoughts. You sleep it, eat it and shit it. You become a time-bomb. They push you a bit more — you blow up. They beat you and you survive. You get strong and you blow again. So how long can a man live this way? I’ll tell you … until he dies, if need be. It becomes a way of life, but I don’t remember it. Why? Simple … it’s painful; it’s empty and alone. Your cell becomes a hole in the earth, it sucks you in. You drown in your own bitterness; it’s not right to live this way.
The door opens to feed you. It’s fear, all eyes on you. One little movement and … BANG! They’re on you, bending you over; fear causes them to do this. They’re afraid of losing an eye and if they put their faces near you they may never see their kids again, simple as that. Who the fuck wants to live like that? If they crept in ten-handed in the night, silently, what’s to say they’re not going to kill you? (Make it look like suicide.) And I’ll tell you what — they can do it. You’d better believe it!
Prison madness is much the same. Insanity is plentiful in prisons. These days with the drug culture there’s not a lot of difference, as a lot of convicts make themselves psychotic and paranoid. Many end up killers, all over petty and minor problems. Where men would once squabble, fight and kill over a half ounce of bacca they now do the same over a gram of white powder or a bag of brown.
And what are the signs of killer madness? Insanity hits home differently. In the max-security asylum, you mostly see dangerous behaviour, very over the top and usually violent. You learn to watch it and say nothing. You allow them space. You allow their moment of madness to pass them by. They feel relieved by what they do. It’s a sense of relief, like a shit; you have to do it. Once you do it you feel better for it.
Sadly, most madmen do things that harm them or others, such as the loony who enjoys strangling; it’s his buzz. He gets depressed when in seclusion, as he can’t strangle anybody, so in the end he hangs himself in turmoil. Their brains can’t handle it. He wants so badly to kill, but they will not let him, so he has to kill himself.
Insanity is a very lonely and empty existence — it’s painfully true. They may laugh and smile, and skip and dance, but behind all the faces there is hollowness like a bottomless pit. The living dead; depression is a terrible illness, so is psychosis, the mentally inflicted beyond cure.
‘Charlie … Please kill me.’ Until you’ve had a lunatic beg you to waste him, you can’t ever understand madness. ‘Strangle me, Charlie … Please, hit me with the mop bucket … Stab me in the ear with that pen … Just kill me, put me out of my misery.’ Until you witness madness, hear it and smell it, you’ll never understand. Some will recycle their own body waste, eating their own shit and drinking their piss — you might not believe it, but it’s true. Years of this can rub off on the sane.
It’s why a lot of psychiatric nurses have breakdowns and broken marriages. It’s obvious why — they’re wrecks. How would you cope with a job in which someone could attack you or even kill you, maybe rape you, maybe even put you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life? What a fucking job! Could you do it? Would you want to? You may as well be a liontamer … better wages.
Insanity is beyond any comparison, it’s unique. An old madman sat next to me in Broadmoor. He had been there for nearly 40 years. He spoke rarely and was very choosy. ‘Hello, Charlie,’ he said softly.
‘Yeah, Pop.’ That’s what I called him.
‘Listen to me, son … today the world will blow up, we will all die. Will you hold my hand when it happens?’
‘Yeah, Pop, sure,’ I said.
‘Charlie,’ he said, ‘will you please pray with me?’
‘Yeah, Pop, sure. We will go together.’
That’s how madness gets to people. It’s death — everything is death. The old boy knew he was dying, so he foresaw an end, but he was basically afraid. He wanted to be told it would be sweet … he needed reassuring.
Another example is the Ape Man; he killed Catweasel, a notorious paedophile. Catweasel was a beast and he got what he deserved, but the Ape Man himself is insane. I call him the Ape Man, as his features resemble a caveman. He will not mind me saying this, but he is a lunatic and should never be in prison.
What about Chris Brand? He drowned a con in Norwich Jail some 20 years ago. Chris was only 20 years old, a young man on remand. But Chris has serious mental problems; in HMP Woodhill, CSC unit, he got depressed and set fire to his own hair. He swallows items like razor blades; he cuts himself. He’s a bloody sad case who should not be in jail.
There is no end. There is no cure. It gets worse with time. Cure? How can you cure an institution? We are bricks crumbling in the walls of despair. Death is inevitable for us all. But the insanity is here to stay. ‘Oy, cunt, who are you looking at?’
‘Me?’
‘Yeah, you!’ SMACK! It turned out he had a dodgy eye. He wasn’t looking. But he could have been.
I leave you, in this chapter, with the pain of the family of an Asian youth battered to death in his cell by a known violent racist. A skinhead, Robert Stewart, murdered Zahid Mubarek at Feltham Young Offenders Institute (YOI) in March 2000. The court of appeal overturned a ruling from a lower court ordering the Home Secretary to hold a public inquiry into the ‘systemic failures’ which led to the murder.
Mr Justice Hooper had found that the right to life guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights required the Home Office to carry out an independent investigation into the death of the 19-year-old first-time offender, who was serving three months for petty theft.
Lord Woolf, Lord Justice Laws and Lord Justice Dyson ruled that a public inquiry was not necessary and that there had been no violation of the European Convention on Human Rights Article covering the right to life being protected by law. So what chance does anyone have when it comes to using the European Rights Act in his or her favour?
The Prison Service has already been found to be at fault. The Appeal judges established this; an inquiry into this had been held and the family were invited to be involved. The cause of death had been established by Stewart’s conviction for murder and there was no basis for prosecuting any member of the prison service. They said there were no ‘factual unknowns’ which would impede the family from bringing a claim in the civil courts for damages.
After the judgment, Imtiaz Amin, Zahid’s uncle, said, ‘We’re devastated. All this effort has just been thrown straight back at us. We’ve been told to shut up by the court. Why was Zahid sharing a cell with such a racist individual? How was such a premeditated murder allowed to happen?’
Imran Khan, the Mubarek’s solicitor, said, ‘To me, this is a travesty of justice.’
So there you have it, just another con killed in his cell … so, fuck it, there are plenty more to take his place — see, this is the pressure placed on us cons serving time. Every day is survival of the fittest and if one of us does get slaughtered, what happens? Fuck all. Maybe you can see why I am the way I am!
Hey … the prison system used to operate like a ship … the Titanic! It went well and then suddenly it sank. Wanna know why? Drugs! You might think cannabis would have been unwelcome in prisons. Far from it! I myself don’t go in for it, but those who did would chill out and behave themselves, and then the mandatory drug-testing of prisoners came into force. Cannabis stays in the system for 28 days or more, whilst crack and the like is pissed straight out of the system, making it harder to detect. Yet the likes of crack and heroin turns cons into killers. Never seen a con on cannabis want to kill anybody, but seen lots on the hard stuff want to run through walls, and could have done. Maybe cannabis should be prescribed for violent prisoners … just a thought!