Episode 5 Crime and Punishment

On Crime And Punishment today, two events that changed policing and prisons for ever.

Brighton, 1984 - a huge terrorist bomb which made the police

rethink the way they deal with massive public events.

And we revisit the month-long 1990 riots at Strangeways Prison,

which spawned copycat disturbances at jails right around the country,

including here in Bristol.

Political party conferences always give police a major headache.

How do you give delegates the freedom they need to move around,

while keeping them safe from terrorist attack?

The stakes have always been high,

but one event in 1984 made them top priority

Almost 30 years ago, the country woke up to these shocking images.

Overnight, all our beliefs about how secure Britain was

were totally shattered.

Breakfast time, October the 12th, 1984,

presenters and reporters piecing together the unimaginable.

The Prime Minister and her cabinet targeted by an attack which left

five dead and dozens injured.

The Brighton bombing left no-one in any doubt that terrorists

would stop at nothing to bring home their point.

There had always been security around political conferences

but this tragedy revealed massive gaps.

Heather Bould was just 23 at the time.

She was working for a company that provided fax machines for the government,

essential equipment for the Prime Minister's office

which had been set up in the Mrs Thatcher's suite at the hotel.

I was asked to go down the Wednesday morning to teach the people in

the prime Minister's office how to use the equipment.

When it came to getting into the building, and right into the PM's room,

she encountered nothing more than a police sergeant on the door.

He looked me up and down and he said to me, "Go on, off you go.

"You don't look like a terrorist."

That was it.

Heather walked straight in, explained the fax machine to

the Prime Minister's aides and left to go home.

Two days later, she woke to the news of the bombing.

I was only young and I thought it was very startling but

it didn't affect me in the same way that it affected my mother,

who was quite shocked by the thoughts of what

could have happened had it been at another time.

At the time, the authorities believed that the level of policing

was enough to match the level of threat but it turned out

that it wasn't anywhere near enough, and the threat today is far greater.

Colin Tansley is a security expert who has spent years helping to

keep leaders safe across the world.

In 1984, the main threat to the United Kingdom

was from the provisional IRA.

The IRA understood that there would be casualties of war.

They accepted that people might be killed.

Now the terrorists that we're up against,

their methodology of attack is more brutal than the IRA.

Their goal is to cause an outrage.

It is to cause the spectacular,

and that means by killing as many people as they can.

The policing of party political conferences has changed for ever.

Nowadays, it takes a combination of advanced technology

and many times more manpower to keep everyone safe,

a task that's fallen to Birmingham police.

Security for the 2011 Lib Dem Conference

has taken months of planning.

The control room is set up two miles away from the convention centre so,

if the worst should happen, the operation can still be managed from here.

We've had a broad variety of policing

functions involved in this operation.

The highest risk we've planned for has been the risk of

public disorder through protest that goes beyond being peaceful.

Also, there is always going to be the risk of terrorist attack.

Clearly, there have been lessons in the past.

Most of those lessons have been in the distant past,

but they haven't been forgotten so, therefore,

we plan and prepare to secure the site, secure the conference

and make sure that we don't open ourselves up to any particular risk.

-Morning, Lou.

-Morning. Can I use a baton gun, MP5 and stick?

Louise Proffitt is one of the 500 officers

working on the operation every day of the conference.

Just an hour ago, she kissed her 7-year-old daughter goodbye

and headed off to pick up her weapons.

We don't start our tour duty until 7 o'clock

but we're normally in for about 6:15.

We're getting ready because

we need to be ready to respond once that call comes in,

to swap over, so if something happens, there's always an armed response.

Louise is one of just five women in the West Midlands Police Firearms Unit.

When she joined the force,

it was with the aim of helping vulnerable children.

Now, she finds herself loading up a machine gun and a pistol.

Magazine pouches, for my handgun, and that's where they'll stay now, hopefully,

until the end of duty when I take them back out.

Taser - always comes with four cartridges

because if we deploy it with the one,

we can reload early and always have the two there.

With equipment weighing two stone, Louise is ready for action.

I'm actually one of the marked vehicles

and there's three officers on that car.

Our role is to provide a presence

so we will patrol around the site of Pelkin,

provide a presence for the public and also for the unarmed officers.

And, later, we'll be looking the massive range of

police measures that it takes to keep the 8,000 people attending this conference safe.

Until the late 1940s, misbehaving prisoners would

find themselves doing hard labour as an extra penalty.

But then it was abolished, leaving prison authorities with a dilemma.

How do you punish a prisoner who's already being punished by being in prison?

Every day, Bristol's duty governor holds the prison's own court

to deal with inmates on report.

Today, it's the turn of Sarah Coombs.

She can punish defendants by withdrawing the privileges they depend on,

such as having a TV in the cell or being able to earn extra money.

The courtroom is on E Wing, the segregation wing,

known to everyone at Bristol as The Block.

First up is an inmate on remand.

He's been caught out by a random drugs test.

-OK, so you admit to taking cannabis?

-Yeah.

So why are you using it at the moment?

I just lost my dad... Well, I lost my dad since I've been in here

and I'm looking at a 12-year sentence over theft, anyway.

So I just needed a bit of escapism cos I felt a bit down, really.

The prisoner claims his depression was caused by not being allowed

to go to his father's funeral.

Well, I'd have liked to have went to the funeral and I'd have liked to

have the opportunity to go and say my goodbyes but I never did.

OK. I understand that and I understand that must have been really difficult.

Obviously that decision was made on the basis of a risk assessment.

-Mm, yeah.

-Have you spoken to chaplaincy at all?

-No.

-OK.

Can we hear the reports, please?

He abides to the wing regime and complies with what is

asked of him and is currently employed on a gym course.

OK. This is your first offence so I'll be taking that into account.

So I'll be awarding, for this, 14 days loss of association.

Loss of association means that, for the next two weeks,

the prisoner will be kept to his cell

whilst his mates enjoy an hour of leisure time each evening.

..and 14 days cellular confinement

but I'm going to suspend that for a period of three months.

So if you find yourself up on adjudication again for a positive MDT,

then that could well be activated,

-so it's a heavy award hanging over your head, OK?

-Yeah.

Through there, Jamie. Name and number to the governor.

-Do you understand the charge?

-Yep.

Next up is another drugs offence.

And, again, the prisoner is pleading guilty.

But this time there's a complication.

Is this your first offence for a positive MDT?

You have had previous, have you? OK.

An MDT is a Mandatory Drugs Test.

They're done at random and there's no escape from them.

In light of that,

I'm going to remand this to go out to the independent adjudicator, OK?

Sarah has no choice but to refer the man's case to the adjudicator,

a visiting judge, because a repeat offence can mean extra time

being added to his sentence.

That's something she's not authorised to decide.

One thing I always try and talk about with the prisoner when in the adjudication is

if they regularly use drugs, and whether that prisoner is upfront

and honest with you about their reasons or not,

and then obviously taking into account whether it's a first offence

or whether they've got a history of drug-taking behaviour,

and then obviously they would get a more severe award as a result.

The next case involves an inmate who has a history of violence.

He's charged with criminal damage.

The officers stand very close in case of trouble.

They daren't take any risks.

Have a seat, please.

Tuck yourself right in there. And again.

Put your leg around the front, please.

Both, yes. Elbows on there?

OK. You've been charged under prison rule 51, paragraph 17,

"destroys or damages any part of a prison or any other property, other than his own."

Do you understand the charge?

Do you need any help at this hearing?

Do you have any questions at this stage?

Have you prepared a written reply?

Calm down. Listen to the governor's questions.

Let me finish my question, please, and then you can respond.

Are you fit to proceed with the hearing at this stage?

How do you plead to the charge?

OK.

Can we hear the evidence, please?

Governor, on the 15th of the 11th, 2011, at 17:40 hours,

I heard a loud noise from cell H107.

When investigating, I found he had smashed his TV and,

on speaking to him, he said he had smashed it because he didn't like his evening meal.

And, er, is the evidence correct?

OK.

OK.

If you've got complaints about the food,

there is a procedure to follow.

Smashing your television isn't the way to go about it.

I suggest that you do.

OK. Through the evidence that I've heard today,

and your own admission, I find the charge proven.

Have you got anything to say in mitigation?

OK.

I'm going to award you 14 days loss of association

and 14 days loss of TV.

You're not earning a particular large amount at the moment anyway,

so I don't feel there's much that I can take off of that.

Yeah, you'll still be entitled to exercise.

You just won't have association periods. OK, that's it. Thank you.

That particular prisoner has got a history of being volatile.

He's got a history of being volatile towards staff.

I believe he may have assaulted staff previously.

You can see by his manner that he was slightly more aggressive

and attempting to, control the hearing

so the staff are just very much conscious of that and making sure

that they're in a position to deal with that individual.

Later, Sarah has an even more angry young man to deal with.

Hang on a sec. Right, to start off, there's no need for bad language.

We'll see how she gets on.

Some of the most momentous changes to prisons came about

following the riots more than 20 years ago.

You may remember this.

April 1990 - pictures that made world headlines the 25 days.

The biggest prison riot in British history.

This is HMP Manchester, better known as Strangeways.

Trouble had been brewing for months because of overcrowding.

As many as three inmates were held in cells designed for one.

At night, prisoners had to use buckets for lavatories,

slopping it out every morning,

and they were also complaining of alleged staff brutality.

Strangeways isn't a hotel but when you're treated like an animal,

you act like an animal.

The governor of Strangeways Brendan O'Friel had advocated

for change in the prison system three years prior to the riot.

There are people in the prison who could be dealt with in some other way.

And what we've got to do,

it seems to me, as a community,

is to constantly strive for not only developing more alternatives

to prison, but fully utilising those that are available.

On Sunday the 1st of April,

prisoners planned a protest during a service in the chapel.

A ringleader, Paul Taylor, who was inside for three years

on burglary charges, took his opportunity.

I made my way from my seat,

fully aware of the very fact that there were going to be,

at the end of service, a sit-in protest...

..and I grabbed a hold of the microphone.

Taylor incited the crowd with a speech and, minutes later,

the protest had escalated into a full-blown riot.

All hell broke loose.

Prisoners attacked officers and keys were grabbed.

Hundreds of cell doors were opened.

The chaos brought violence.

Personal vendettas were taken out on sex offenders.

The prisoners were coming out in such a distressed state.

They were clinging to you. "Mr Wright, get us out!"

Utter shock and fear on their faces, for their lives.

One, Derek Wright, was so badly beaten, he later died in hospital.

By now, barricades had been set up

and rioters had broken through to the roof.

Some, like Taylor, revelled in the notoriety.

Governor O'Friel had plans to storm the prison on day two with police,

but it was vetoed by the Home Office as too dangerous.

A stand-off ensued and specialists were brought in to negotiate.

Many prisoners gave themselves up

but the hardliners wanted to continue the protest.

They got everything they asked for, effectively,

and yet there's no accounting for a brick-wall mind.

Over the weeks,

authorities tried psychological pressure - helicopter searchlights,

sirens, even officers beating their shield and shouting "beasts"...

Beasts, beasts! Beasts, beasts, beasts!

..prison slang for sex offenders,

and not least the hoses, making the rioters cold and wet.

But some just laughed it off.

Relatives were allowed to call up and try and persuade them to come down.

Take care of yourself. I love you.

By week three, there were only ten still there

and police started to gain control.

Prison officers, let back inside, were shocked by what they saw.

It's very hard to describe.

It's just a complete wreck.

It was just utter, sheer, wanton criminal damage.

Finally, on the 25th day, still grandstanding,

Taylor and four others were the last to come down in a cherry picker.

When they went, the siege was over. 18 prisoners were put on trial.

Charges were for violent disorder, GBH, conspiracy to riot and murder.

Taylor was given a ten-year jail sentence for his role as ringleader.

A major enquiry, headed by Lord Justice Woolf was set up.

His report said prisoners should never be put three to a cell

and recommended that the practice of slopping out should end, and it has.

Repairing Strangeways cost £55 million and, today,

leading lights in the prison service say the riot really was a turning point.

The Strangeways riot was copied in jails all over the country,

not least here in Bristol, where up to 400 prisoners

took control of three wings and kept control of them for two days.

With me now is Governing Governor,

also known around the prison as Governor One, Kenny Brown.

-Nice to meet you, Kenny.

-Nice to meet you.

Tell me about the changes that were made here in Bristol after those riots in 1990.

I guess the physical changes, as you can see by looking through

the wings, it's pretty much been halved from what it was before.

-So that wall wasn't their?

-No, it would have been a full wing.

The wing was twice the length it is now and those physical changes

were brought in pretty much to control prisoners in the future,

if such rioting took place again, so that's what you can see physically.

And then on top of that, there were enquiries

and from there we looked at the staff-prisoner relationship

and how that could be bettered, to stop riots happening in the future,

and training for prison officers

and all sorts of different things were then implemented to make

the relationships work better than what they were before.

And you were instrumental in these changes, weren't you,

because of your personal experiences and working on that relationship

between the prison staff and the prisoner.

Yeah. Well, I guess I was instrumental at Bristol.

I wasn't instrumental from 1990 but,

as far as my experience goes at Bristol, when I arrived here,

the staff-prisoner relationships were OK. They weren't brilliant.

I did want to implement a lot more stuff

around the culture and decency, so that prison officers

understood their role in terms of being mentors for prisoners, and

the importance of their influence on turning prisoners' lives around.

And that does come from my background.

My background, briefly, is from a working-class area of Scotland,

where times were quite difficult and lots of people were

getting into crime quite easily because that was what it was.

I think the difference to me

at that time was that I pretty much had a strong family

and good influential parents who actually made a difference,

otherwise I'm quite convinced I would have ended up in prison myself at one stage.

But because you know that side of things,

you're able to help things from this side of things in prison as well.

Just briefly, has that system worked?

I think what you see at Bristol is that from 1990,

another big change is that the prison officers working in Bristol

are probably 50% less than were working at that time.

The reason why that works so successfully,

it's actually a lot safer than it was in 1990, but the

staff-prisoner relationships have been enhanced considerably.

Safety is more about how good the relationships are

between the prisoner, rather than having numbers.

So what you see here now is prison officers who are determined to make

a difference for society, in terms of role-modelling for prisoners.

Therefore, when they're released,

they're much less likely to commit crimes and, therefore, there is

less victims and prison officers at Bristol

understand that and want to put that back into the Bristol community.

-Thanks for your time today, Kenny.

-Thank you.

-Cheers.

Today we've been watching how the West Midlands force have been

protecting the Lib Dems at their conference in Birmingham.

They're ready for anything

and it's not long before their preparations are tested for real.

The Brighton bombing in 1984 demonstrated how deadly

a terrorist attack on a political conference could be.

In Birmingham 2011, West Midlands Police are taking no chances.

Using all the equipment available to today's police,

they've drawn a circle of steel around the centre

hosting the Liberal Democrats' annual bash.

The most likely worst-case scenarios that we would plan for

would be the finding of a package, a suspect package,

inside the International Convention Centre.

So we'd have to very quickly and orderly

take at least 3,500 people off the premises so we could work

on that device and find out whether it was a genuine threat or not.

It's a massive operation to keep everyone safe.

500 police officers from all departments are working

round the clock with modern specialist technology

to ensure there's no threat to the delegates.

Every nook and cranny has to be checked out

and, on one side the building, that means a dip in the canal.

You can imagine that a narrow boat is, basically,

one massive void under the water and water level,

would be a good place to leave anything that could cause a disruption to the conference.

At the moment, Martin and Sarah a fingertip search

along the hull of the boat

It's designed to indicate to us

any anomalies that are either attached to the hull

of the boat, or anything built into the boat that shouldn't be there.

Can you feel if I push there?

-Like the riveting plates?

-Yeah.

The Brighton bombings were the catalyst regarding police

search of counter terrorist incidents, and as a result of that,

all the police forces in the country have got police search trained officers,

who are trained to conduct low-level counterterrorist surges.

As well as underwater, they have to go underground, too.

After a first safety check with their high-tech camera,

they get in for a closer look.

So, once the drain's been searched, and it's clear,

We have a rubber seal with an individual number on it,

and it's burnt onto the drain.

And then it's noted.

-And there's a lot of drains.

-That one's done.

Move onto the next one. There's 750.

Yeah. Thanks, Alpha one.

If you give me one or two minutes, I'll call you up

and ask the location of the principal.

The principal is the Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg.

It's inspector Paul Minor's job to coordinate the firearms unit

and some of his team are the last line of defence for the VIPs.

This is traditionally a body guarding-type operation.

The officers are working around

the deputy prime minister

on this occasion. One of the key factors, today, is continually keeping his convoy moving

rather than having it static and stationary.

So, there are occasions when as he enters into the conference site, some of the barriers

need to be opened and moved prior to him getting there,

so it needs to be a slick movement through, rather than him simply staying stationary

whilst the barriers are opened and negotiations take place.

This is quite an important part in the close detection operation.

As well as talking directly to his officers on the radio,

Paul can also see them.

We have CCTV cameras all around the city of Birmingham,

to be able to identify and observe officers on patrol in the area.

It's particularly useful in the event of an incident,

because we can work out what they are seeing at any one time.

Then we can communicate directly with them and draw additional resources into the system.

The police have every possible area covered, from bread rolls

entering the building, right up to their eye in the sky,

the police helicopter.

The whole five days of conference, 500 offices must remain vigilant.

Nothing can be allowed to slip through the net.

'Some bikes just going round Five Ways Island. Bear with us.'

Anything suspicious is a call for immediate action.

POLICE TALKS ON RADIO

This car has been picked up on police CCTV as it's

entered the controlled zone around the conference centre.

Anything that approaches the cordon is treated as a threat.

And their system has recognised the number plate

as being from a stolen car.

There is a possibility that this car could become extremely high risk

and it must be stopped before it reaches that stage.

'When we get the opportunity, we'll go for a reinforced stop.'

Right now, they have no way of knowing who's in it or what their intentions are.

The force helicopter has been called in to follow the car

and guide the officers on the ground to it.

Observer, Matt Smith, is on board.

'We're just waiting for it to come off.'

If you know the location,

And you know specifically what

sort of vehicle you're looking for,

so any descriptive details of that vehicle certainly helps.

But, because it was a specific type of sports car,

it was relatively easy for us to spot.

'..I think I see two traffic motorcyclists, now.

'Yeah, it's two vehicles in front of him, at the moment.'

With the great camera system we've got on the aircraft,

we can read registration plates from the air.

So we were able to identify the vehicle very quickly and effectively.

'OK, it looks like the vehicle's stopped...'

The way we live today, terrorism is in the news every day,

and a threat to government, ultimately,

could be a terrorist threat.

So, we are always on alert for a terrorist type situation.

Certainly, a vehicle of that nature, a stolen vehicle, potentially,

yeah, could have been a terrorist threat.

The driver's arrested

and the car moved well away from the conference site.

The massive security operation has proved successful,

as it has at every party conference since the '84 Brighton bombing.

Throughout the rest of the week, there were no more potential

threats, and a strong message has gone out.

Whatever you feel about prisoners and their crimes,

the fact is a sentence impacts

innocent families, too.

Each year, 160,000 children see a parent go to jail.

Now, there's a new way to stay in touch.

It was Christmas Eve, and Baby Owl had been out in the snowy woods.

Toby Diamond's a local lad serving five months for driving offences

and a cannabis possession.

It's not the first time he's been inside,

and over the years, he's missed a lot of time with his kids.

If I'm honest, I'd like to have been around with the children a lot more than I was.

I was out and about, doing my hobbies, motocross racing,

and stuff like that.

Looking back on things, now, I wish I was home a lot more.

But, because he's behaved himself in Bristol,

Toby's one of the lucky ones chosen to take part in the Storybook Dad Scheme.

I'd heard about it around the prison, and I'd asked one of the members of staff that deal with it

if I could get involved in it and do the next available slot.

Toby's recording a Christmas story for his five children.

The kids actually hearing me read them a story is a lot better

than them just receiving a book or a story from somebody else.

it means a lot to them, actually, just hearing their dad, even though I'm not there with them,

it might make them feel I'm there reading the story to them.

Working with Toby, today, is Bristol's families and children officer,

Stuart Harrington.

He runs several schemes in the prison designed to make better

parents of the inmates.

We encourage prisoners to keep in

contact with families,

purely because it's understood that any prisoner who does keep

in contact with his family while he's in prison

has a higher chance of not offending when they are released.

They need to remember that it's out there that's real life, not in here.

"Good night, Mum," said Baby Owl.

Toby's done his bit,

but his recordings need tidying up before it can be given to the kids.

110 miles away at Dartmoor,

Toby's efforts are already being worked on

in the Storybook Dads edit suite.

They add sound effects,

and music.

They've been running the scheme from here since 2003 when the charity was founded by Sharon Berry.

In the beginning, we just had an empty prison cell,

so, that's where we started from.

It's grown to now being in over 100 prisons across the country.

For Sharon, the prisoner is making a commitment to his family

just by making the recording.

They have to disengage from the person that they

have to be on the wing,

and you're in a prison, perhaps with 100 other men on the landing,

and prisoners tend to put up a guard.

But when they come to us for the first time,

they can be quite difficult, but usually we managed to help them

to relax and they're usually very pleased

when they hear it for the first time

and they want to come back and do more.

Once the finished recording is burned to a CD,

they make a customised label and it's ready for sending back to Bristol for checking

and then on to Toby's family.

We'll find out later how it goes down with his children.

TV crime series like CSI may make us a bit blase about using forensics to catch criminals,

but the reality is that it's a constantly evolving science and I'm about to discover

some of the latest techniques that are being used to solve crimes.

Ryan, here in the UK, we don't call it CSI, do we?

We're forensic scene investigators in the West Midlands.

And you're going to show me.

-Clearly, somebody's stood on here.

-Yes.

What kind of information can you get from this?

We'll get some foil. And we'll go over the area that we need to test.

-OK.

-So, we can see some marks, there.

And, hopefully, there's going to be some marks that...

-We actually can't see...

-..Yes.

..Already. OK.

So, this device has got a nine volt battery in it.

-We send a charge through the foil.

-Oh, gosh. Look at that.

-So, it sticks it to the surface.

-There's a big air bubble.

So, what we do is we'll turn the voltage up very slightly.

-And, as you can see, that's pretty much disappeared.

-Yes, it has. OK.

And we'll use this just to roll out.

The underside is black and that's sticking, now,

to those dusty marks that were on the work surface.

-Yes.

-And that's picking that up. That's charging this foil.

And it's only a small charge, so it's not going to you any harm.

I wouldn't touch it.

Everything that's on that surface, now,

should be stuck to the underside of this foil, so, we, hopefully,

we've got those trainer marks that we could see first.

-Which were about three or four, weren't they?

-Yes. And, hopefully, then we can see.

-Oh, my goodness!

Look, there's more than trainer marks. There's a great big handprint.

That's right. So, what we've got there is some fingerprints, hopefully.

Now, if we look at fingerprints and we don't have any detail,

then we might look at DNA, so, we could swab...

But, if you look at the surface, I couldn't see anything.

-Right. And, sometimes, the best marks are the marks that you can't see.

-OK.

Now, hopefully, this should aid us, in seeing those trainer marks.

You can see those three very clearly.

Now, by using this light, it would just enhance that.

So, you can see these marks, here, this is quite clearly four fingers from someone's hand.

-Yes.

-So we look at that area, as well.

-Yes.

Now, these trainers, quite clearly from the same foot.

And now we look of that detail on there.

You've got an example, haven't you?

-On your machine of when you've used this, actually, haven't you?

-Yes.

A bank robbery that I went to where the offenders had come down through the ceiling.

-So, it was a bank, they'd gone into a flat above it.

-Yes.

-An unoccupied flat.

-Yes.

The offenders had broken in the night before

and they had taken back the carpet.

They had removed the floorboards, as you can see, there, with axes and hammers

and they'd made a hole into the floorboards and they waited,

then, for the following morning, so the bank staff had come in,

the bank is still closed, the safe's had been opened, and, at that point,

they had then gone down to the ceiling, creating this hole.

Into the safety area, as it were, in the bank.

-Got the money.

-That's the safe. It's completely empty.

And they'd gone out, down the corridorr.

Now, this is the serving area.

So, this is where members of the public normally are.

This had been cleaned the night before, and the only people that had gone through were the offenders.

We put a couple of sheets down and we've done exactly what we've just done there

and we had some very good marks.

We managed to identify some suspects and when we arrested those suspects

their footwear matched some of the trainer marks we had at the scene.

That's fascinating. Thank you very much.

Earlier on, we sat in on a disciplinary hearing.

Now, Sarah Coombs has to do deal with the prisoner

who's already spent time on the segregation wing.

He's been through this process nine times before.

OK, you've been charged under prison rule 51, paragraph 17,

destroys or damages any part of a prison or any other property other than his own.

OK? Do you understand that charge?

And are you OK to proceed

with the hearing?

How do you plead to the charge?

OK, so you plead guilty to the charge of destroying or

damaging prison property.

The prisoner has been vandalising his cell

and the exercise yard with graffiti.

Can we hear the evidence, please.

Governor, I was conducting a cell fabric check,

and noticed the word scratched into the paintwork on the window ledge inside the cell.

The same word had also been scratched into the paintwork in the exercise yard.

OK, we'll get to that in a second.

Do you understand the evidence, first of all? Yeah?

Are there any points in the evidence that need clarifying?

I take it from your response

just then that yes, OK.

OK. You'll get a chance to put your story towards me in a moment. When did you do the damage in the yard?

OK, but...

OK, whether you cleaned it off or not,

you said to me that you did that, initially.

The prisoner doesn't have a defence.

And why did you do that?

Through the evidence, and your own admission,, I found the charge proven, OK?

Have you got anything to say in mitigation?

Apart from the fact that you were bored.

OK.

Can we hear the reports, please?

He has nine previous findings of guilt on adjudication,

eight of these have been in this establishment.

Two reports for a similar offence to this one.

Sarah can punish the prisoner by withdrawing privileges within the prison.

But this inmate's already been confined to a cell for two weeks after a previous adjudication.

OK, I'm going to award, for this,

seven days stoppage of earnings at 50%.

And seven days loss of canteen.

You've been on cellular confinement for the past two weeks, OK?

Is that correct? Two weeks?

16 days, OK.

And the staff have said to me,

since you've been down here,

you have been abusive to staff.

You obviously had a proven

adjudication the damage to

cells and the yard.

Have you seen healthcare

since you been down here?

OK, that's not an appropriate way to talk about staff that work here. OK?

They've got a lot of prisoners to see.

Sarah's seen many prisoners who are unable to take responsibility

for their own actions and blame everything and everyone else.

His reason for not complying with the regime was

because he slept till three o'clock in the afternoon.

His reason for not being compliant is he's not on the correct medication.

I'm going to sign you up for 72 hours good order or discipline. OK?

And we need to think about how we'e we going to progress you

back to normal location.

You need to start demonstrating some compliant behaviour.

Why not?

Right.

OK.

But, it's your responsibility

to behave.

You can't be reliant on medication. It's your choice and your decision.

You just said, yourself, that you do things your way.

I suggest you have a think about how your way...

Hang on a sec. To start off,

there's no need for bad language.

It's not appropriate, no.

Second of all, right,

you've demonstrated on a couple

occasions already, that you could behave.

And be polite.

There's no need for that.

No, it's not.

OK. I've told you what I expect, OK?

The staff have been quite clear.

They expect you to comply, not be rude, not be swearing,

and engage, constructively, with the regime, OK?

So, I'm signing you up for 72 hours and then we'll make a decision,

then, about whether it's suitable for you to go back

to normal location.

I don't, I don't,

I don't have that plan, at all.

That's up to you,

to demonstrate your behaviour.

Yes.

We'll be working with him over the next few days,

to try and get him to take some responsibility, really,

and see that the onus is on him to progress out of segregation.

The prisoner will be back in adjudications in three days

before another duty governor.

And, hopefully,

he'll be in a better frame of mind after 72 more hours on the block.

The gym at Bristol is not just there to keep the prisoners fit,

it's also a way into a job on the outside.

Louise has been along there.

This is our weight and fitness suite.

OK, so, it looks like, kind of like a normal gym.

-Well, that's the idea, to get it similar to an outside gymnasium.

-Yeah.

And the point of having it is...

Twofold, we've got two activities. We've got rehabilitation PE.

You can see on the treadmill, there, and we've got our PE course in front of us,

so we got two activities in the gymnasium.

And, can people just come in here

and work out as and when they wish or not?

No. Part of, you know, the government legislation

and the working prisons agenda,

we have no recreational PE in the core day.

You or I can't go and access a game of badminton,

we can't leave work and go and play football.

It's the same within Bristol prison.

The recreational gymnasium, early mornings before work,

dinner times and prisoners' own time, evenings and weekends.

-And can I speak to one of them, as well.

-Certainly. Benji?

-Got a second?

-Hi, Benji. I'm Louise. Hello.

-Hi, are you all right?

-Yeah, good.

So, what do you use the gym for, mostly, and how is it helping?

It's helping me, I guess, with my confidence, my self-esteem,

and that, and a lot of us have had a lot of issues

where we haven't always looked our best, you know, alcohol, drug problems, and whatnot.

So, I guess, to be able to come to the gym and get fit

and healthy, healthy body, healthy mind.

It makes me feel a lot more positive.

And what about after you leave?

-Have you got qualifications that you will be able to take on and use?

-I have.

I've gained qualifications whilst here in Horfield,

Level I gym instructor, and then, this month I'm down to start NVQ level II

which is fully qualified gym instructor, so, hopefully,

that will give me more confidence to go out and gain some employment.

-And do you think it will help you stay out, as well?

-Definitely, yeah.

I mean, I've been in and out quite a lot since I was quite young.

I'm 31, now, so I've got no trade, or,

no real experience in working, so, if I can get this under my belt,

hopefully, fingers crossed, that will help.

OK, well, thank you very much.

Now, Toby Diamond was sentenced to five months in prison for a series

of driving and drug offences.

Toby knows the punishment for his crimes is prison,

but his five children are the innocent victims in all of this,

and it's been almost impossible for him to keep a meaningful relationship with them.

Until, he discovered Storybook Dads.

Toby's now out of Bristol and trying to reform his ways.

'..and Baby Owl have been out in the snowy woods playing on his sledge..

Toby's wife, Terry, and their five children are listening again to their dad's story.

Storybooks Dad meant that the kids got to hear their dad,

to know that he was still there.

And they listen to him at night so it was like their bedtime story.

And it was always, "Come and listen to dad."

"Can we put dad on?"

To me it meant that he was trying to keep that communication open between him and the kids.

That's a great improvement over the old days before he went inside.

I think I've had my fair share of acting a prat

and going out gallivanting and doing what I was doing.

And being inside has made me realise that it's time to sort myself out and settle down.

My time now is to spend with my family.

The children have had the best present of all. Their dad back home.

Clever girl.

That's it for today.

Join us next time on Crime and Punishment

when we'll be looking at more of the changes in prisons and policing

since the Queen came to the throne.

Bye for now.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd