Prisons: Have a heart at Christmas

As the season of goodwill approaches I'm reminded of how at this time of year one of the main things on the minds of people in prison is food.

Already prisoners all over the country will be stocking up on biscuits and other goodies saved for from prison wages and purchased from the prison "canteen".

From the daily provisions allowance, prison cooks will be skimming a little here and there so that they can put a little extra on the cons' plates over the forthcoming holiday in order to make Yuletide inside a little more palatable.

Yet it won't be long before popular newspapers are carrying mock-ups of prison Christmas menus, designed to outrage the man in the street and infuriate pensioners.

But regardless of their circumstances, prisoners are still people and in spite of their incarceration most will experience festive treats in one form or another. As my second Christmas in the world of the free beckons I recall a couple of my favourite repasts behind bars.

The first was the oddest meal I'd ever had. Queuing up at the hotplate on Christmas eve lunchtime in my first high security prison I was suddenly distracted from my conversation with the man in front of me by the sight of a tray of unfamiliar animal organs.

The curious items were brown and pear shaped and had what looked like bits of rubbery tubes attached. Of all the sights I'd been greeted with at mealtimes since my sentence had begun, this creepy-looking pile was the most intriguing.

"Sheep hearts," said the prisoner in the grey, originally white, serving jacket standing behind the serving counter when I asked him what they were. "A Christmas present from a local farmer," he added.

"Christ," I whispered. They looked like they had just been torn from the animals' chests by a gnarled, warty hand.

Many were coated with layers of yellow fat. The rubbery bits, I realised, were the remnants of major arteries, some of which had what appeared to be snippets of lung still attached. I noticed nobody appeared to be taking their portion.

"Yes please," I said, to the obvious surprise of Greyjacket. He uttered a wide-eyed snigger as he untangled a heart with his aluminium tongs and placed it gingerly on my stainless steel meal tray.

Then I had an idea. "Is there any spare?" I asked, prompting a look of disbelief. Before he could say anything a voice from behind me chirped up, "You can have mine," followed by another, and then another and another. By the time I got back to my cell my tray was laden with more than a dozen of the little delicacies.

I'd never cooked a meal in prison before but I knew that people did. On the ground floor of the wing a cell had been converted to provide "cooking facilities" (a Baby Belling cooker had been installed alongside a table and a metal bench.)

Every night a tense queue of hungry cons formed, pans and little bags of ingredients that had been filched or bought illicitly from the prison kitchen, in hand. Some saved their hotplate food and enriched it with spices and food bought from the prison shop (tinned fish or baked beans.)

I was amazed that nobody had seen the potential in the sheep hearts, especially that day of all days.

After quickly trimming the fat and other debris from the hearts with my plastic knife I sawed them into bite-sized pieces. In the afternoon I managed to borrow a pan and trade a quarter of an ounce of tobacco for a couple of onions, some potatoes and carrots and an oxo cube from a kitchen worker.

As soon as the doors were opened at 6pm for "association" I rushed down to the makeshift kitchen and then queued for an hour before getting my pan on one of the little cooker's big rings.

The hour left before bang up was just enough to boil and simmer my stew to perfection before it was time to scuttle back to my cell, where behind a locked door I stared through the bars of the window at the starry sky and enjoyed my, er, hearty feast, alone. This first experience of cooking for myself eventually added a whole new dimension to my prison time. I became a regular in the queue for the Baby Belling, where, despite the disagreements, arguments, and fights, I managed to pick up a variety of recipes and tips which at least once week helped me to create a meal that was tasty, filling, and nutritious.

And then I met Mr Patel. Mr Patel was a man with few associates, as far as I was aware. Whenever I saw him he always seemed to be carrying a small pan around. It was under his chair in the television room, or on his bench in the fabrication workshop where we worked.

He even took it out on the exercise yard. He couldn't have stood more than five feet high, yet unusually for such a small and obviously defenceless man nobody ever bothered him.

That was until the night he was shoved out of the Baby Belling queue. Without thinking I stepped in and stuck up for him. To my relief Mr Patel's challenger backed down and let him back in. Later Mr Patel and I became acquainted and as a reward for my earlier modest assistance he shared with me the secrets of his pan.

"Pilchard curry," he said, as I tasted a spoonful, which left my taste buds singing with joy. "I teach you how to make."

It was one of the most wonderful tasting meals imaginable and in time became my very own signature dish.

Every year I produced a special Christmas panful for my neighbours, yet despite my seasonal largesse, following Mr Patel's untimely passing I always resisted attempts by fellow cons to get me to share what I had idiosyncratically come to think of as my own "secret recipe."

Now I feel the time has come. In my next column I will reveal all.

By Erwin James posted 24 November 05

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Alice prisoners riot

Alice Springs Correctional Centre superintendent Peter Rainbird would not say why prisoners had staged the riot.

But he said guards would consult prisoners about concerns in the jail.

The Territory's jail rate is 580 per 100,000 people compared to the national average of 154 per 100,000.

Mick - It's hot - the food is shit and there are next to no rehabilitive programs. I read all the books before my eight days were up. Borrowed more from inmates. Besides all that - most mob shouldn't be in there.

- You could release most of the NT prisoners safely

How the hell are they coping in the heat with a piss-bucket for company?

By Just Us posted 18 November 05

Jail lockdown as riot rages

A TERRITORY jail was locked down yesterday as maximum security prisoners rioted.

Inmates in the reception area of Alice Springs jail's maximum security section barricaded doors and set fire to mattresses about 10am.

Guards responded by locking the jail down and rushing to the area, clearing the prisoners and putting out the fires within an hour.

Eight prisoners involved in the riot were taken to isolation cells.

Alice Springs Correctional Centre superintendent Peter Rainbird would not say why prisoners had staged the riot.

But he said guards would consult prisoners about concerns in the jail.

Supt Rainbird would not say which prisoners were involved in the riot but confirmed it would be investigated and jail procedures would be reviewed.

"Once we finish the investigation we will be able to deal with the issues,'' he said.

NT Police also will investigate the riot and may lay charges of criminal damage against the prisoners.

Firefighters were called out but the fires had been extinguished when they arrived.

The jail's maximum security unit remained in lockdown last night.

"There was only superficial damage caused,'' Supt Rainbird said.

"Public safety was not compromised at the time.'' He described the incident as "moderately serious''.

By ERIC TLOZEK 16nov05

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PRISONERS threatened to riot at Darwin jail after complaining about overcrowding and the quality of food, it was learnt yesterday.

Fifteen officers donned full riot gear including arming themselves with large gas pumps as a group of inmates sat down on the ground and refused to go to a routine muster.

The three ringleaders were whisked away to a maximum security block after a tense two-hour stand-off.

One prison source said: "There was no violence in the end but it was touch and go.

"Once a few of them get together you can have a monster.''

The prisoners are believed to have handed a letter of grievance to Darwin prison.

Trouble started at the maximum security B and C blocks on Thursday morning.

Correctional Services director Jens Tolstrup said public safety was never threatened.

"The incident was not a major disturbance,'' he said.

"All the inmates [prisoners] dispersed willingly and voluntarily and without incident.

"There was no lock-down, no violence and the rest of the prison operated as normal.

"The three inmates involved have been moved from the block into other accommodation. This is standard practice for these situations.''

The source said it was "very unusual'' for riot gear to be issued.

He said several of the prisoners had told officers they would "take the blocks out'' a euphemism for a riot.

The source said the prison was overcrowded, adding: "Everybody is hot at this time of the year and tempers fray.''

The source refused to name the ringleaders who are not serving life sentences.

He said they were well-known within the prison system but not outside.

Darwin and Alice Springs prisons each hold about 400 inmates each. Both are nearly full.

By NIGEL ADLAM 29 October 05

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TASMANIA: Prison Action & Reform was formed in response to the five deaths in custody that occurred between August 1999 and January 2000. Chris Wever, Vickie Douglas, Rose Macaulay, Judith Santos and others came to together to fight for reform in an outdated, increasingly cash-strapped and uncaring system. Of the original members, three lost loved ones to the Tasmanian prison system.

MISTREATED IN CUSTODY - NO ACCOUNTABILTY
I was in custody in NSW six weeks ago, and was a victim of an aggravated assault incited by a prison officer. Despite this happening in front of many witnesses, including correctional services officers and other detainees, and under mandatory video surveillance, a formal complaint to the NSW Commissioner of Corrective Services an his Professional Conduct Management Committee only revealed that as far as they were concerned, this didn't happen.

ICOPA XI International Conference on Penal Abolition
We are excited to announce that ICOPA X1, the eleventh International Conference on Penal Abolition will happen in Tasmania, Australia from February 9 - 11,2006. Please pass this onto all networks.

Ex-Prisoner Locked Out of Prison
The NSW Department of Corrective Services (DCS) has revealed a policy which bans ex-prisoners from entering prisons.

Justice Action: Access to our community
NSW: Justice Action went to the NSW Supreme Court before the last Federal election on the constitutional right for prisoners to receive information for their vote. The government avoided the hearing by bringing prisoners' mobile polling booths forward. We pursued it after the election. This is the report.

Risdon prisoners' seize prison to protest mistreatment
Apparently one prisoner had been mistreated and held in isolation in an SHU (Segregation Housing Unit) [Solitary Confinement] because, he'd had and altercation with a screw. SHUs cause severe mental harm - regarded as torture - and are a cruel, inhumane and degrading way to keep prisoners.

No Safe Place
In a brief four month span from August 1999, five men died in Tasmania's Risdon prison. Their deaths have put the state's corrections system in the dock and led to the planned demolition of a jail which even the State's Attorney-General now calls an "appalling facility".

MORE PRISONERS LOCKDOWNS HAVE OFFICERS ON EDGE
NSW POLICE Commissioner Ken Moroney has issued an ultimatum as well, to the lawless youths holding Sydney's streets to ransom?: Learn some respect or face jail?

Tough line on crime fills jails
The tough law-and-order policies of governments around the nation are behind an explosion in the prison population by almost 80 per cent in the past two decades.

FAMILIES OF PRISONERS FORUM
14,500 children in NSW go to bed each night with a parent in prison!

LEGAL VISITS AT PARKLEA PRISON
I am a prisoner in NSW and I am currently held in Parklea Prison. I am concerned about what is going on in NSW prisons and this is my story.

Parklea Prison: No calls for six days
The last calls that were made out of Parklea Correctional Complex by my partner, an inmate in remand at Parklea, was on Wednesday 2 February. The phone lines for the inmates have been out of service to this date.

Prison visits in crisis in NSW
The reason I am writing today is to address a difficult situation that my husband and my family are going through. My husband is currently serving a sentence at Lithgow Correctional Centre in NSW.

Prison boom will prove a social bust
Hardened criminals are not filling NSW's prisons - the mentally ill and socially disadvantaged are, writes Eileen Baldry.

The prison system requires assiduous oversight
As NSW Attorney General Bob Debus noted in 1996: "The kinds of complaints which occur in the system may seem trivial to outsiders but in the superheated world of the prison, such issues can produce explosive results."

Where the Norm is Not the Norm: HARM-U
In the absence of public policy, this paper is an attempt to shine a light through the rhetoric and test for coherency in the policy and function of NSW’s only supermax prison, the High Risk Management Unit. Its present use will be compared with the ‘vision’ flogged by the Premier and the Department of Corrective Services (the Department) at its inception in 2001.

Crime and Punishment
Mark Findlay argues that the present psychological approach to prison programs is increasing the likelihood of re-offending and the threat to community safety.

People: 'Prisoners' of Drugs'
People who are addicted to heroin usually take the drug because it relieves them of problems such as low self-esteem, distrust and fear of abandonment. They may have poor communication skills & poor relationship skills.

Justice Denied In NSW Corrective Services
There used to be a (VJ) or Visiting Justice who would go into the prison and judge any claim or accusation that was made by any prisoner or prison guard. If it were found that a prisoner had offended then punishment was metered out.

Prison guards test positive for drugs
NSW prison visitors banned from using the toilet The visit is only for about one hour and any thing less than that is an insult. If it's proved that a visitor has broken the rules the punishment should apply to them. But collective punishment on all visitors should not be made general when others haven't broken the rules especially if it restricts all visitors from normal human needs like using a toilet.

NSW prison visitors banned from using the toilet
The New South Wales Government has introduced several initiatives to stop contraband getting into prisons they said last Friday. But under the guise of "stricter rules" the department had also introduced banning all visitors including children from using the toilet unless they terminate their visit at any NSW prison after using the toilet.

Watchdogs slaughtered in NSW
On Tuesday the Carr Government reduced transparency and accountability yet again and New South Wales is in danger of becoming entrenched with cronyism and intimidations with the Carr Labor Government that continues to slaughter the watchdogs.

Avian Flu hyped for profits?

Louis Pasteur, father of the germ theory, confessed on his deathbed that he was wrong about the germ being the cause of disease. The famous quotation went like this. "It's the soil, not the seed."

From the time we were little children and given those vaccinations supposedly to prevent us getting sick, we've been taught to be fearful of bacteria, viruses and that we pass these harmful germs to one another and is why we get sick.

In response to the stupid hype about bird flu I've written a piece about how i see it... Far from a normal life So what's a normal healthy life? Tim O'Shea describes a normal life

You're born. You get no drugs and no vaccinations. During childhood you have the usual illnesses, but conservative treatment gets you through them without antibiotics or drugs, and you build your natural immune defenses. You don't eat white sugar, white flour, hydrogenated oils, too much meat or cheese, or drink soft drinks or pasteurized milk. You concentrate on whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and a clean, natural diet. You never learn to drink coffee or to smoke cigarettes.

The only pills you take are natural antioxidants and enzymes and minerals, which are part of your daily intake. You drink at least 1 liter of water every day. Into adulthood, you never get sick: no colds, no flu, no headaches, no diabetes, no ADD, no "thyroid problems," no panic attacks, growing pains, fatigue, or digestive disorders, no high blood pressure. The only pains you experience come from accidental injury.

Perhaps you do moderate exercise or sports activity to maintain mobility and general fitness. You look to the care of your spine. Your entire adulthood is spent in this disease-free mode. As you age, your mind gets sharper, your body gets stronger, your immune system tougher. You experience no arthritis, cancer, or osteoporosis, no Parkinson's or Alzheimer's.

Finally one day after 90 or 100 years, you flicker like a candle and go out In these days of Bird flu paranoia, Sars, Hiv/aids and the list goes on we have come a long way from Tim O'Shea's normal life.

I've often wondered why our health needs so much attention.
Oh, that we could live our lives as described by O'Shea.
Where did we go wrong?
Could it be the invention of the germ theory?

The germ theory is the original basis of orthodox medicine

It states that infectious diseases are due primarily to invasion by certain aggressive micro- organisms and that a specific germ is responsible for each disease.

Yes that's what we have been told all our lives.

From the time we were little children and given those vaccinations supposedly to prevent us getting sick, we've been taught to be fearful of bacteria, viruses and that we pass these harmful germs to one another and is why we get sick.

Germs are associated with disease but the point is whether they are the primary cause or mere secondary factors.

Judie C. Rall from The Center for Unhindered Living writes:

The state of development of these organisms depends upon the state of the medium in which the germ lives. In other words, the microbes which live in our cells and assist the cells in maintaining a healthy state will mutate into bacteria, fungus, and viruses when the tissues of our bodies in which they live change to provide a medium for their growth. They begin to become "pathogenic" when the pH of the tissues becomes more acidic.

These primitive organisms can live in our bodies in the microbe stage indefinitely, and do not cause disease.

Most of the germs which enter our bodies from the outside are quickly killed by the immune system. But it is the microorganisms which live permanently in our bodies that cause us to get sick. And they cause sickness because we provide them with a rich growth medium so that they can mutate and transform themselves into deadly bacteria, fungus, and viruses.

So you see, whether or not we get sick and die has very little to do with what germ we catch, but has everything to do with whether we keep our bodies free of the dead matter which these germs feed on. The dead matter these germs feed on is produced when the pH in our bodies is altered from a slightly alkaline state to a progressively more acidic state.

When we eat too much processed food, especially sugar, when we smoke too much or drink too much coffee and alcohol then we become sick.

Next step is medical treatment in the form of antibiotics

Ross Horne Author of health and Survival in the 21st century 1992 says that 'to believe that antibiotics and vaccines offer a way to cheat nature would be a dangerous error. Nature cannot be fooled and her justice is uncompromising.'

Nature's unforgiveness can be witnessed by all the side effects that come from the medical treatments such as antibiotics and vaccines.

Vaccines were developed in light of the germ theory.

We are told that there are all these germs out there - that we have no ability to protect ourselves or our children against them.
The present germ is the avian flu virus.
We are told to prepare for the worst!

The bird flu virus or H5N1 is very same bird virus that was being "researched", meaning it was being actively changed and cultured, when Liu Jianlun, a laboratory scientist in China's Guangdong province became the first SARS victim two years ago - on 4 March 2003.
Remember the SARS epidemic.

Well it came and it went but not without making people very scared and most likely making a lot of money for drug companies, the researchers of course.

The media managed to convince the world that it was facing a great threat when in reality SARS turned out to be a comparably minor disease with 8,500 infected world wide and around 812 deaths. We need to compare such figures with the 100.000 U.S. deaths from the damaging effects of pharmaceutical drugs in the same time span.
Just what is going on?

Well we know they are preparing a vaccine to fight the current bird flu. Can it be that the whole fiasco is just to make more money for the drug companies and to provide jobs for researchers that is to keep the wheels of capitalism going around and around and around. Hm...

An article in the age on 24th September illustrated the way things work: The article was discussing the high costs of drugs for baby boomers and the ethics of the health industry.

David Wroe and leonie Wood reported that Health minister Tony Abbott sees health care as an investment, not just a cost. If, for example, a drug costs $50,000 but generates $100,000 by keeping people at work and increasing their productivity, it is a plus for the economy.

Our health minister regards health care not as care but as an economic opportunity and a way to keep people employed. That is it keeps wheels of capitalism buzzing no matter the cost in loss of ethics and honesty, not to mention the loss of real health or a normal life as articulated by Tim O'Shea.

The World Health Organization has flatly stated there will not be enough vaccine to go around. On their web site, they say, "production capacity for a pandemic vaccine will be vastly inadequate unless other companies engage in vaccine seed development and preparation of batches for clinical testing." They also state that in the event of a pandemic, vaccine will be in short supply and will likely be unequally distributed
More fear is provoked, and more demand for vaccine is thus whipped up.

Then there's the money to be made for testing. They have developed a bird flu test!

Well the test doesn't actually isolate the virus. It will only detect antigens to the virus Antigens, only give us an indication that a germ is present.

And of course there's a good chance you will test positive to the test. In doing so this will increase the numbers of people supposedly suffering from bird flu, whereas in reality they are not.

But numbers is what they want in their efforts to scare the common people. And if there is such a thing as bird flu making the birds sick and die well then the finger needs to be pointed at the living conditions of the birds.

Let's look at the way the poultry industry is run in these days of globalisation and economic injustice. The birds would be kept in shocking conditions and as I said at the beginning it's not the germs that are the problem it's the body that is toxic making the germs multiply and cause trouble.

Poultry all live in a stressed anti-nature world. People live in a stressed anti people world. So why wouldn't we all get sick! Tim O'Shea writes:
The body is poisoned year by year, leading to general toxemia (blood-poisoning.)

The reasons are noted above: chemicalization of commercially available food, chemicalization of all medical drugs, and stressful toxic lifestyle. The body tries to detoxify itself by its normal processes of digestion and immune response. But it's too big of a job; there are too many weird chemicals. Digestion is blocked. The blood stagnates. The white cells and antibodies can't circulate. The colon backs up. And things breed. Favorable environments are created for the proliferation of normally harmless organisms.

Result: disease.

But telling the truth would not make any money. Cleaning up the poultry industry would not make any money. Making our world a cleaner, more pleasant place would not make money.

So the hunt continues for the vaccine and the stockpiling of anti-virals continues. Does the media ask about the safety of all these drugs and vaccines?

And if we do see a pandemic will it be a result of untested vaccines injected into willing and scared and ignorant people?

The germ theory and its acceptance allows this terrible state of affairs to continue.

It needs to be challenged. It allows the use of vaccines. Vaccines are not needed and are not safe.

Ian Sinclair in health the only immunity writes:

Graphical and statistical evidence shows that in excess of 90% of the decline in death rates from infectious disease occurred before vaccination commenced this decline owing its existence to improved sanitation, hygiene, improved nutrition and living arrangements.

That almost every polio case in the US in the previous 30 years had been associated with the vaccine itself, the same vaccine given to Australian children. That millions of children in third world countries are still dying from measles, TB tetanus, polio despite being fully vaccinated.

Sinclair confronts the obvious question

If Vaccination doesn't work, if it's dangerous then why are we still vacinating children and ourselves?

His answer:

Vaccination is an enormous industry, reaping huge profits with doctors and govt health departments under the control of the drug industry.

They have immense power and wealth , they have control over the medical profession , the medical education, and the mass media , of course. One of the most effective ways to manipulate and control people is through fear. Fear of disease and dying children.

There is but one type of immunity ,

HEALTH

You can give all the vaccines you want but they do not give immunity

Immunity, from the medical viewpoint, is a state in which the body's immune system is capable of recognising and destroying specific disease causing germs. So for example, if the body has immunity against measles, then supposedly, should the body come into contact with a measles germ, the immune system will take immediate action to destroy the measles germ thus preventing measles. Sounds fine in theory but it doesn't work in practise.

Many studies have shown that measles, rubella, diphtheria and other infections can still occur in fully immune individuals.

*our immune system is not designed to fight off germs, for in reality, germs are not our enemies but our friends. Their real purpose is to feed on the waste matter within our bodies and thus assist in the important task of keeping our system clean. The true relationship between man and germ is not one of open warfare but one of peaceful co-existence, a relationship that Biology refers to as symbiosis.

Louis Pasteur, father of the germ theory, confessed on his deathbed that he was wrong about the germ being the cause of disease. The famous quotation went like this. "It's the soil, not the seed."

By L Pasteur posted 3 October 05

Offenders to be fed vitamins to improve behaviour

UK: offenders are to be given vitamin supplements in an unusual attempt to reduce anti-social behaviour which will test the effect of diet on the brain. The move is controversial, with many in the prison service sceptical that healthy food could make much difference to abused prisoners.

The proposals being drawn up within the Home Office reflect a growing interest in the potential link between junk diets laced with additives and disturbed or hyperactive behaviour. American research has shown a link between poor diet and aggressive or impulsive tendencies, including a recently published US study of young children from Mauritius which found they were significantly less likely to grow up to have unlawful records if fed an enriched diet from a young age.

The Youth Justice Board is helping to organise the British trial, which would involve young offenders who are serving community sentences, or who have recently been released from jail, being given daily supplements of fatty acids, trace minerals and vitamins to see if it reduces anti-social behaviour.

'We have agreed to assist them by facilitating access to young people where necessary,' said a spokesman. 'We are interested in seeing the results of this.'

The project raises ethical questions. While only volunteers will take part, if dramatic results from changing offenders' diets can be shown, that will raise the question of whether prison diets should be altered to 'dose' prisoners' into better behaviour.

Conversely, the approach is likely to be attacked by right-wing critics as allowing offenders to escape responsibility for their own crimes by blaming their diets?

However, a small previous study of teenagers in a young offenders' institution carried out by the research charity Natural Justice, found that boosting offenders' diets with supplements reduced disciplinary incidents - such as attacks on fellow prisoners and guards, or breaking prison rules - by a third.

Prison menus don't offer healthy options, the researchers should realise that prisoners avoided the unpalatable food in favour of a diet of junk food that left them deprived of nutrients.

The charity wants to try to replicate the findings using a much larger group of young offenders, and examine the effect on their reoffending rates.

Bernard Gesch, chair of the charity, said: 'We are very pleased that they are interested enough to look at this. The implications are fairly massive: the government is forced to pump millions into anti-social behaviour programmes, and surely given the scale of findings we demonstrated [in the young offenders' institution] the dots aren't too difficult to join up.'

Prisons Minister Paul Goggins disclosed recently in a parliamentary written answer to the senior Tory MP Alistair Burt that the Home Office is considering research on offenders' diet.

The Prison Service is currently awaiting the results of a similar study involving offenders in Holland.

By Gaby Hinsliff and Just Us posted 1 December 04

Related:

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Inquiry must root out prison racists
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Prison suicides soar as jails hire 'babysitters'
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Plan to sell off juvenile jails as job lot
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Failure to sack 'racist' prison staff condemned
UK: Two prison officers suspended for racism are still on full pay three years after a stash of Nazi memorabilia, neo-fascist literature and Ku Klux Klan-inspired 'nigger-hunting licences' was found in a police raid on their home.

Report slams 'unjust' jailing of women on remand
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Concern as UK prison suicides hit record level
UK: More prisoners took their own lives in English jails in August than in any other month since records began, prison reformers said today.

A life inside: Erwin James
This is my last prison column. After 20 years, I'm free. I just didn't expect it to happen with so little ceremony.

End of years of despair as Holloway closes its doors
UK: It has housed some of Britain's most notorious women prisoners, including Moors murderer Myra Hindley, serial killer Rose West, Diana Mosley, aristocratic wife of fascist leader Oswald Mosley and, most recently, Maxine Carr, girlfriend of Soham murderer Ian Huntley.

UK Miscarriages: Loss of innocence
Can anyone comprehend what it is like to spend years in prison for a crime you didn't commit? Eric Allison tracked down those still haunted by the experience - the victims of miscarriages of justice, and their families.

Prison service 'on brink of a race crisis'
Britain's jails are plagued by a culture of racism among a hard core of officers and have been rocked by allegations that black prisoners have been made to fight white inmates, [prisoners], for the amusement of warders, according to the union chief in charge of 33,500 officers.

How detox and self-help brought suicide jail back from the brink
UK: Six suicides in 12 months made Styal prison notorious and the Prisons Ombudsman criticised the prison and its staff for serious failures. But things are changing.

Restorative Justice Practices
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UK: The injustice of jail
UK: Give or take Alcatraz, few prisons have a grimmer reputation than Holloway. The former chief inspector, David Ramsbotham, once declared it too disgusting to assess. Others have called the jail's cockroach-infested blocks the worst in the country. Holloway, its image pitched somewhere between Dante's Inferno and the penitentiary wing of Fawlty Towers, has never seemed a candidate for a good slammer award.

Belmarsh prisoners consider suicide, says freed man
UK: The first of the Muslim prisoners released from Belmarsh high security prison after being held on suspicion of terrorism, [scapegoats for the Coalition of the Killing's resource war's in the Middle East], has [said], his fellow prisoners are suffering such 'severe mental problems' that they constantly consider suicide.

Revolving door: Criminal Law System
UK: They are just the opposite of master criminals. Indeed, in the words of Nick Davies in his latest three-part Guardian series on the criminal justice system, [? criminal law system], their criminal careers reflect "the same muddled inadequacy as they handle the rest of their lives". They were nearly all born and raised in chaos.

How the Prison Service Works
1.Abuse and torture inmates at HMP Wormwood Scrubs
2.Take years to admit a regime of violence and torture.
3.Settle 46 claims, paying 1.7 million to prisoners.
5.Carry on as before.
4.Keep 11 of the 14 prison officers responsible in their jobs.

Prisoners must get right to vote, says court
UK: The government will be forced to lift a ban on prisoners voting dating back to 1870 after the European court of human rights ruled yesterday it breached a lifer's human rights.

Cherie calls for women to be kept out of jail
UK: Cherie Booth today launches an impassioned attack on the jailing of women, warning of a 'cycle of poverty and crime' spiralling down the generations unless more female criminals are spared prison.

Blunkett charges miscarriage of justice victims 'food and lodgings'
UK: WHAT do you give someone who's been proved innocent after spending the best part of their life behind bars, wrongfully convicted of a crime they didn't commit? An apology, maybe? Counselling? Champagne?Compensation?

Prison needle cleansing programme
The Department of Health and the Prison Service appeared to be at odds last night over a needle cleansing programme designed to protect prisoners from blood-borne infections such as HIV and hepatitis.

England tops the EU in imprisonment
England and Wales jail more offenders per capita than any other European, Union country, according to new figures. The imprisonment rate of 141 per 100,000 makes the countries the prison capital of Europe for the second year running.

Don't put mothers behind bars
If we are to arrest the soaring prison suicide rate among women, we need to look at alternative punishment.

UK Prison Abuse: Guards Holding Nooses
'We will kill you. We will get away with it... we've done it before' Prisoners tell of hanging threats by officers holding nooses.

K K K in the UK
In the documentary it is alleged an officer dressed in a Ku Klux Klan mask at a training centre in north-west England. An undercover reporter from the BBC also claimed to have taped racist comments by some officers.

Suicides and unrest have soared, admits Home Office
UK:The already overcrowded prison population is set to go on rising and will top 80,000 within the next three years, a senior Home Office civil servant warned yesterday.

My Sarah was smart and talented - Why did she die in jail?
LONDON: Sarah Campbell was just 18 when she killed herself [? committed suicide,] one of seven women to die in jail this year. Our correspondent asks why so many women kill themselves in prison [? commit suicide in prison.]