Britain's Jail System

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Discussion

jdw100

4,126 posts

165 months

Tuesday 8th November 2016
quotequote all
I have a cousin who went to prison, a youth offenders one. As I recall he did something like racially abuse a taxi driver...lovely.

He had been in trouble with the Police before - low level stuff etc.

He was deservedly sent down for a few months.

Not being the sharpest tool in the box, obviously, even he was shocked by fellow inmates. He went from being at the bottom of the class at school to being amongst the brightest in the priston simply because he could read and write.

He got involved in his short time there in helping others learn to read. Many of these kids had been through the school system (as we all have) yet failed to have learnt the basic skills that enable you to get by in society.

I tell you what though the shock of the prison really turned him around - came out and got a job, now married with two kids and, overall, a decent young man. I think he could also see the effect it had had on his family - the shame and embarrassment that it caused them as decent people.





Esseesse

8,969 posts

209 months

Tuesday 8th November 2016
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Once I parked up near the prison in Bedford. It took me several seconds to realise what was going on, but there was a guy at the bottom of one of the prison walls pulling what looked like a fishing line back to him until whatever was on the other end of it came over the top.

Perik Omo

1,912 posts

149 months

Tuesday 8th November 2016
quotequote all
FredClogs said:
Two prison related stories on the news tonight...

2 serious crims escape from Pentonvile by cutting through the bars and Bedford prison looks and sounds more like a freshers dorm, prison officers union boss on the telly just now saying the system is fubar'd. Underfunded and over used.
I have two near relative prison officers, one senior just below governor and one a senior officer at Bedford that have just gone and got jobs in the NZ prison service which they take up in January. They have just had enough of the UK prison service and felt like it just wasn't worth the hassel any more.

Digga

40,339 posts

284 months

Tuesday 8th November 2016
quotequote all
jdw100 said:
I have a cousin who went to prison, a youth offenders one. As I recall he did something like racially abuse a taxi driver...lovely.

He had been in trouble with the Police before - low level stuff etc.

He was deservedly sent down for a few months.

Not being the sharpest tool in the box, obviously, even he was shocked by fellow inmates. He went from being at the bottom of the class at school to being amongst the brightest in the priston simply because he could read and write.

He got involved in his short time there in helping others learn to read. Many of these kids had been through the school system (as we all have) yet failed to have learnt the basic skills that enable you to get by in society.

I tell you what though the shock of the prison really turned him around - came out and got a job, now married with two kids and, overall, a decent young man. I think he could also see the effect it had had on his family - the shame and embarrassment that it caused them as decent people.
Saw the same with a nephew. If you're not a 'proper', resolved criminal type, a detention centre is very much the short, sharp shock. No one could talk to him before hand - there was utter inevitability about the trajectory of his life, up to that point - but since release he's held down the same job for over a year now and is a different person.

It could so easily go wrong though, because the assaults on other inmates and the amount of drugs available do not help, and the reduced numbers of prison staff combine with this to threaten to change prisons from places of reform, to places of acceleration of criminal activity.

jdw100

4,126 posts

165 months

Tuesday 8th November 2016
quotequote all
Digga said:
aw the same with a nephew. If you're not a 'proper', resolved criminal type, a detention centre is very much the short, sharp shock. No one could talk to him before hand - there was utter inevitability about the trajectory of his life, up to that point - but since release he's held down the same job for over a year now and is a different person.

It could so easily go wrong though, because the assaults on other inmates and the amount of drugs available do not help, and the reduced numbers of prison staff combine with this to threaten to change prisons from places of reform, to places of acceleration of criminal activity.
It was the violence and bullying he saw that also put him off ever going back.

He was quite scared despite thinking himself a bit of a tough guy.

FredClogs

Original Poster:

14,041 posts

162 months

Saturday 17th December 2016
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As widely expected things are going from bad to worse...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-38...

FredClogs

Original Poster:

14,041 posts

162 months

Tuesday 20th December 2016
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Hull prison next...

https://inews.co.uk/essentials/news/hull-prison-br...

Having been to Hull yo have to wonder why they'd want to break out...