Damage as prisoner throws tantrum and floods his cell
Saturday 19th March 2011, 2:29PM GMT.
Prison governor Terry Wright confirmed the flooding but said reports of an inmate on the roof were wrong. (Montage by John O’Neill) 0827533b
AN INMATE flooded his cell and damaged the prison building during a ‘tantrum’, it has been confirmed.
The incident on Thursday night, first reported in yesterday’s Guernsey Press, led to prison officers calling the police in for back-up.
Police officers attended but did not enter the prison, remaining on the periphery of Les Nicolles until order had been restored.
A police spokesman yesterday confirmed the incident was being investigated but said that no one had yet been charged.
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Why are they being given water in the first place? This is a prison, not a hotel.
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Throw a wobbly, pay the cost. Simple.
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Mr G,
You’ve outdone yourself and beaten your previous best!
(the previous best being http://www.thisisguernsey.com/2011/03/02/runway-work-will-add-to-heavy-lorries-on-the-roads/#comment-88726 )
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Add 6 months or 2 years to his sentence, depending on the damage done and the labour needed to clean it up.
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Two years sounds about right.
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u can add time to them but they wont lean from it noone does they always end back in there as its not a prison its an hotel and maybe if the prison got the people the right help they wouldnt be the way they are,
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guernsey
Quite a sweeping generalisation there don’t you think? I know plenty of people who have been in prison for one sentence only, then learned the error of their ways.
As for the “hotel” comment, that tends to be the opinion of either a)people who have never served a sentence or b)people who are of low intelligence. To most people the fact that they have lost their liberty is a huge punishment, because it means loss of job, lack of family contact, no social life etc etc.
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Police officers attended but did not enter the prison, remaining on the periphery of Les Nicolles until order had been restored.
What were they called for then? was it in case he attempted an escape on a motorbike over the fence
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What a surprise, the old “prison is like a hotel” comments are out in force. The last time I visited a hotel I had the choice when I could leave.
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Paul, it’s better than a hotel – you also get free education, free fags, a free sofa, LCD TVs, Sky +.
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Read betwwen the lines – this was not a tantrum from an inmate. It was a major incident that was too embarrassing for the Prison and Home department to admit to. Maybe inmates would not lose it if they were treated right in the first place. Why wind up an inmate when you know they have little control? Shame on you officer. At least there are many decent officers in there who know how to speak to, support and help inmates. To the man who said’why has a prisoner have water- it is not a hotel’ What a ludicrous comment to make and so short sighted of you. If prisoners got the right mental health support instead of being left to rot in solitary confinement for months, you would not get incidents like this. Wise up Guernsey – you have longed failed those with mental health problems – in prison and the community.
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Mr G – get your facts right. They do not get free cigarettes, tv, sofa – Do you want prisoners to be rehabilitated or not? So yes they have education. Your narrow mindedness ,low intelligence and perception levels are quite staggering. No water either Mr G. Hilarious if it was so serious.
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AJ, why should they be given water if they abuse it like they have? Maybe they should be given the recommended 8 glasses a day instead of a tap.
They do get free cigarettes, they get given a nice pay pack each week to buy them, and if you didn’t see in the press a few months back it had them getting LCD TVs and a sofa.
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phil i know what the prison is like thank you ive been there myself and when i was there, there wasnt much help for me with my bipolar and i selfharmed many times in that place so dont tell me what i dont know
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StoneDeCroze:
Perhaps they were called as a contingency.
c o n t i n g e n c y : look it up, you might learn something.
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guernsey
Why do you want the prison to get you help? cant you do that for yourself if you know you have a problem?.
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bcb – Bi-Polar is a debilitating condition but mental health services here and in the UK are very poor at dealing with it.
If you had a condition whereby your legs ceased to function correctly at random intervals and for variable periods of time you’d get plenty of help. However, if your mind does the same and you’re not a particular danger to anyone but yourself then the system really does not have the time nor inclination to assist beyond handing out pills.
When one has reached rock bottom and found oneself in prison how does one then get help given that you’re locked behind a wall?
Nothing to do, no one who cares when the desperation and depression kicks in, self harm is the cry for help.
Prison can, and should be, a positive experience that changes lives for the better. The lives of the offender and the community in which they once offended. It takes the funding of more than Turnkeys to achieve that though.
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Hello:
All good in theory, except that experience has shown us time and time again, throughout the world that prison/incarceration does not rehabilitate. The notion that it is a fix for people who want to offend is pleasant, but unrealistic. We should be honest, and consider prison to be a place where people go to be punished and to get them away from the majority of acceptable society so we can all live in peace for a while.
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Hello – Many of us support investment in the prison to ensure as many as possible are helped resolve their difficulties and be rehabilitated. The problem is that the “prison is like a hotel” brigade jump on any investment, even suggesting that inmates shouldn’t be given access to running water!
In this respect, “guernsey” didn’t help his cause, as he himself called the prison a hotel – before proceeding to criticise the treatment he was given. A rather contradictory comment I’m afraid.
I would love to see more investment in the prison, more opportunities for education, better treatment of the mentally ill. The more people we can get rehabilitated, the less re-offending we’ll see and hopefully the less people we’ll see in prison. This is good for social cohesion – not to mention economically sound.
For those who say prison should be a punishment, my answer is that it is. The punishment is having your freedom taken away. Even choosing the clothes you wear is a privilege that must be earned.
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Paul Le Page:
Whether or not prison is a punishment is a matter of perspective. I would hate it, and I suspect you may too, but that is just us.
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Truth Man – although I can see your point (the homeless for example might see prison as a place to get a hot meal and a bed) I think the overwhelming majority would view denial of liberty as a punishment.
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Paul Le Page
There are another group of people to add to the list and that is the ones who are prepared to do a stretch every now and then because they still think it is worth paying that price to live the life styles they choose. One such group are the drug smugglers and i`m sure there are many others.
I`m not suggesting that all of them see it that way but there have even been repeat offenders over here. It`s not that they think they won`t get caught it`s just when and how much they can make before they do.
Hello
Thanks for the response. Maybe people such as you describe should not be in a typical prison in the first place?.
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Truth Man
truth man
You are priceless, truly priceless,
a one man crusader
I have visited people in our prison and it is a terrible place.
I would sleep easier in my bed if i knew that the prison service was trying everything to make people better citizens after release than then when they went inside.
if you want me to spell out the torture of what being inside for a man is i will but it won’t make pretty reading.
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Kevin:
I have also visited prisons many many times. I have also seen the houses and situations many of the prison regulars come from. To call prison torture in contrast simply shows your one sided impression of the situation.
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I have been to the States prison and rather than it being a “hotel” on the one extreme or a “terrible place” on the other, it just reminds me of boarding school.
In fact, the prisoners enjoy many more luxuries and liberties than I had at school, and the punishments at school for e.g. so little as whispering at night were far more severe.
I didn’t view my schooling as a punishment so I certainly see no harm in the prison regime being tightened up to match at least that of an old-fashioned boarding school – particularly for the young offenders whose rehabilitation would be aided substantially.
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one i am a female and i know alot about the prison and only an inmate would know about the prison aint as bad as u lot think its worse for famale’s but there aint much help with people who have bipolar or any illness. when ever i selfed harmed they would put me on the block which made the matter worse, one day we were going to have out time in the court yard and the nonce’s were out there aswell us girls went mad as the officers made a mess up. thats just abit of what i know.
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Truth Man – Could you explain why you came to find yourself visiting many prisons? It what capacity? Inmate, solicitor, policeman, warder, plumber?
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Hello:
I have spent all of my adult life working in the legal professions privately, on projects teams, support services (in the UK) and in courts (in the UK). Progression throughout my career and chasing unusual, challenging but rewarding roles has seen me in and out of prisons all over the UK and equally, in some roles in and out of the houses of inmates too.
I’m not sure why you ask though – is my CV relevant to my opinion?
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Truth Man – On this particular topic your CV is of course relevant to your opinion. Prisons are closed worlds. A place that thankfully few visit but many have an opinion, those opinions frequently uninformed. The classic ‘Prison is like a hotel nowadays’ should make me chuckle but sadly just makes me angry.
You say that prison does not rehabilitate. A large percentage of offenders do not re-offend but it is indeed by no means the majority.
You say you’ve seen the houses that many of the prison regulars come from. Which regulars? The vagrants, petty thieves, smack heads often don’t even have a home to come from. They are usually poorly educated and unsurprisingly dyslexia seems highly represented in UK convicts. Is not the low level crime of these that troubles neighbourhoods more than the relatively rare high profile robberies and murders.
You say rehabilitation around the world has failed. I’m not sure that too many countries have really put much effort or investment into it? Quite what you expect locking people in a cell or letting them wander aimlessly around the wing to do I’m not sure?
Nothing is done with these people.
As for punishment – I thought loss of freedom was the punishment? What would you advocate?
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Hello:
What would I advocate? I would advocate a shift from the rather idealistic notion that prison is a place for rehabilitation, to a notion that prison is a horrible place to be. I don’t just mean that prison is a horrible place to be for people like the majority of the law abiding public, I mean it should be a horrible place to be whether you are a vagrant, petty thief or even if you are dyslexic (I say jokingly as I would love to know where you found that statistic!).
Don’t get me wrong, I know my concept may also be idealistic but it is based on my experiences and conversations with prisoners – and as such I know they current system does not work. Don’t get me wrong, rehabilitation should be on the list and factored in in a sensible way – but we must admit and deal with the fact that most do not get rehabilitated and find solutions for the majority.
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Hi Truth Man. I don’t recall prisons being particularly nice places. Maybe they only sent you to the pretty ones?
My statistic came from the head of education of large London local prison. There have been some wildly differing results of research into the topic ranging from 50% (Reid, G. and Kirk, J. (2002) Dyslexia in Adults: Education and Employment) to 4% (Rice, M. (1998) Dyslexia and Crime: Some Notes on the Dyspel Claim. Institute of
Criminology, University of Cambridge) The mean seems to be about 20%.
What seems more consistent is the figure of circa 50% for very poor numeracy and literacy. Not easy to find a job if you can’t read and write.
According to the Social Exclusion Unit’s report on Reducing Offending by Ex-Offenders (2002) 80% of individuals leaving prison lack the skills for 96% of all jobs:
• Half of all prisoners are at or below Level 1 (the level expected of an 11-year-old) in reading
• Two-thirds are below Level 1 in numeracy
• Four-fifths are below Level 1 in writing
• 52 % of male and 71% of female adult prisoners have no qualifications
• 30 % of prisoners were regular truants during their school years
• 49 % of male prisoners were excluded from school
• 58% of those released from prison are reconvicted within 2 years
• 4 out of 5 prisoners have served a previous sentence
Might education not solve part of the problem? My experience is that prison education is underfunded, is often disrupted by interruptions to the prison routine and prisoners being moved around.
There are also substance abuse issues to be effectively dealt with.
Maybe too many people want prison to be a place of ‘punishment’ not because it’ll solve any problems but because it’ll make them feel just a little bit better?
There are parts of the world with far more harsh and violent justice than our own but they too are far from crime free.
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Truth Man for Chief Minister
Most of Hello’s stats appear to be self inflicted ‘wounds’
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Hello:
They certainly didn’t only send me to the ‘nice’ prisons – quite the contrary. I have seen open prisons right through to those only catering for Cat A. Trust me, I have seen just about all that a prison has to offer.
With regards to the remainder of your post – like I said, a nice idealistic notion…. that has been proven not to work. You may want to throw good money after bad, but personally, once a person has been identified as being the type who does not want help and is happy to wallow in their own criminal lifestyle I believe we should lock them up, in part as a punishment, but in the main to rid ‘nice’ members of society from them for as long as possible.
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