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Jenny Mooney
PRISON VISIT
THE USA, DIFFERENT COUNTRY, DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE
I’ve had a long and interesting career in the criminal justice system, and latterly the senior civil service. The best part (looking back with those glasses that help you forget the grim bits) was working in prisons – Iatterly when I was in charge of first Deerbolt Young Offender Institution and then HMP Holme House. I left (and joined the Retired Prison Governors Association) in 2016, retiring from full time work in September 2019, though I’m still keeping my hand in! And shortly after my retirement, I got an opportunity to visit my friend – let’s call him Dave – who is serving a life sentence in the US. This article is an attempt to share my impressions, and perhaps to make some sense of an event which had more of an impact than I had anticipated.
Rewind to the late 70s. Whilst I had spent most of my teenage years wanting to be a prison governor (thanks mainly to Googie Withers who made it look so easy), I shifted my goal and trained as a probation officer at a university in the Midlands. Dave was a friend of friends really – the best friend of the boyfriend of one of my flatmates. I always thought of him as American – he had a strong American accent, and he spent a lot of time in our company. An intelligent, open and kind young man – I remember that he had a car and would sometimes give me a lift to the station when I was off to visit my boyfriend who lived near Newcastle.
We lost touch after graduation, although we both stayed in touch with a mutual friend Mark. Fast forward to a reunion in 2003, when I met up with Mark and he told me that Dave was on remand in prison in New York for – allegedly – killing his wife– let’s call her Jane – whom he had met when we were at university. Dave and Jane had lived together in the UK for many years – Jane had 2 children whom Dave brought up as his own – however in the late 90s, Dave had been offered a job in New York – they had married at that point and gone to live there.
I was shocked to hear this and wrote to Dave, but again lost touch – he was convicted in 2004 and sentenced to life with a 26 year tariff – I made contact again a few years ago when Mark told me that Dave was quite low and asked me if I would write to him. Since then I’ve written a couple of times a year – it’s quite difficult to know what to say and of course, I wasn’t able to talk about my work! Another mutual friend, Martin, visits the US to see family and every now and again does a whip round – various of us donate a small amount and Martin navigates the complexities of paying into Dave’s spends account! And that was the level of my contact with Dave, until last year.
I retired as I had reached a significant birthday, for which my elder son decided he would treat me to a trip to New York! An amazing present! In the early planning stages, he said ‘haven’t you got a friend who’s in prison in New York’ – and the idea was planted…….
New York is, of course, a big state……when I checked google maps I realized that visiting Dave was not just going to be a matter of hopping on the metro – however having got the idea, I was determined to see it through, despite the fact that it would involve an internal flight, hiring a car and an overnight stay. I tried to prepare well: I wrote to the Governor (Superintendent) – and got a reply. I had a conference call with Mark and Martin, both of whom had visited Dave, though in a different prison and several years ago. I researched the internet from which I gleaned that visits at this particular correctional facility took place only on Saturdays and Sundays; that they were from 8.30 -15.00 (yes, really), and that no visiting order was required – one could just turn up, as long as the ‘inmate’ (shudder) was expecting you. At this stage I hadn’t let Dave know that I was going – clearly I didn’t want to raise his hopes if things didn’t work out – however the Deputy Superintendent emailed me to confirm that although Dave should only have visits on the ‘odd’ days of the month (because his prison number ends in an odd number!), I would be allowed to visit on the day I requested – 8th December – because I was coming a long way. She sent me an authorisation, and copied it to Dave – I then sent him a card to explain what was happening.
I found myself people watching, and that felt very familiar. There were seasoned visitors, waiting patiently, many with young children; new visitors who were anxious and didn’t know what to expect; elderly parents (I assumed), young girlfriends/partners. There were no refreshments, and the provision for young children was a small supply of colouring books and blunt crayons. There were torn notices on the wall advertising drug courses and urging friends and family to report any concerns about the safety of their loved ones to staff. I noted with a mixture of amusement and irony that the soap dispenser in the ladies’ toilet was branded ‘Liberty’. What I hadn’t anticipated (although friends tell me this used to happen in our prisons) was the delivery, by the seasoned visitors mainly, of huge quantities of food! I realized that the system was that you booked in, carrying several supermarket bags for life full of doughnuts, bagels etc. – then when your name was called, took these bags to the bubble where they were handed over, presumably for searching before being passed to the prisoner. People would then take their bags back to their cars and return to the Visitors centre to wait……
I also worked out, and my friend the ‘volunteer’ confirmed, that people were being called into the prison in groups of 4 – and eventually, around 11.00 (yes, really!), I heard Dave’s name called. The volunteer cautioned me to curb my excitement! He warned me that the next stage involved being booked in at the Gate…….
Through to the gate I went. An unfriendly young female officer was booking people onto the IT system, which was interminably slow. A small girl in front of me skipped excitedly – her mum spotted my passport and was really interested to know that I’d come from the UK. She was visiting the little girl’s father, she said – he will be out in 2021, she will wait. All very familiar. Every woman who went through the metal detector was setting it off. A male officer was then handing them a brown paper bag and sending them to ‘Room 1’ where they had to remove their bra, put it on the bag, give the bag to the officer to be put through the scanner, go back through the arch, retrieve the brown paper bag and go to ‘Room 2’ to put it back on. One woman was furious ‘mine’s all plastic, I bought it especially’. I was of course subject to the same procedure – whereupon I discovered that Room 2 was in fact a toilet, and occupied. I asked if I could go back to Room 1 – ‘no you can’t, it’s for security reasons’. At this point I’d been in the States for just over a day, and, until I got to the prison, I had been struck by how friendly everybody was. Whilst nobody at the prison was rude or unpleasant, they were brusque and unsmiling. A young man just in front of me kept setting the metal detector off. Staff said it was his pants (trousers to you and me), and suggested he went back to the visitors centre and ask to borrow some joggers. He demurred – whether that was because he didn’t want the indignity or hassle, or whether he actually was trying to get something in I don’t know – he declined his visit and said he’d come back another time.
I made it through to the airlock by about 11.30. I was frustrated, of course – I’d deliberately come early but hadn’t anticipated all the waiting: and it had not finished. Dave is still a maximum security prisoner because of his sentence length, but he is in a wheelchair, and is therefore in a hospital wing in a medium secure prison. He’d written to me on receipt of my card to say how much he was looking forward to seeing me, but also to warn me that he was not allowed to go to the Visits hall, and that I would be taken from the gate to the hospital wing in a prison van! He also warned me that the staff were not particularly quick about providing this transport. But soon after going through the airlock, showing my ultra violet stamp to the officer and explaining again why I was there on an even day of the month, I could see a black van at the end of a short walkway, and the gate officer opened the door and waved me through. Once again, my excitement was short lived. The driver got out, held up his hand and said ‘I’m not your ride’. I went back to the lobby and waited. And waited. Eventually I went back to the airlock, and asked very politely why I was delayed. ‘Ah Ma’am – at this time of day we have to count all the prisoners so there is no movement’. I was caught up in a roll check! Memories of just how long they can take flooded back. In my governing days I would sometimes go to the control room and enquire gently just who it was who couldn’t count….here I was powerless to do anything but wait until the roll was reconciled. At about 11.50, I was allowed through and onto the prison van, and then to the hospital wing. At about 12.15, having been at the prison for 3.5 hours, I was finally able to see my friend!
The visit took place in a room which Dave said was, during the week, used as a waiting room for prisoners seeing visiting consultants/dentists etc. There was a vending machine but no cups (I hadn’t had anything to eat or drink since leaving my hotel). One prison officer seemed to be in charge; he was not unfriendly and quite discreet. Dave had to wheel his chair so that he was facing the prison officer. But we were able to talk, and talk we did! I’d confessed to Mark and Martin that I was worried that we might run out of things to talk about – don’t worry they had said – he’ll talk! Dave gets very few visitors. His dad died many years ago, his Mum is very elderly and lives in London (I rang her after the visit, she was so pleased to hear from me). The children he brought up will have nothing to do with him. I had not intended to talk about the alleged offence (Dave denies absolutely that he killed his wife) – but he wanted to talk about it – but we also reminisced, talked about music and bizarrely about Shakespeare – Dave was an English scholar and I’ve seen many performances in the 18 years he has been locked up. He seemed to me to be resigned to his sentence – he is eligible for parole in another 8 years, but told me he thinks he will be in his seventies by the time he is released. My recent work has brought me into contact with a few people who have been inside for a long time, and I know something of the practical issues that brings, quite apart from the emotional toll. Dave was incarcerated in the early days of mobile phones – I had set up a WhatsApp group for myself, Martin, Mark and another friend. I’d called it ‘Friends of Dave’ and because he is (still) a Spurs fan, had used a Spurs logo as the icon. I tried to explain this concept to him! It was the only time in the visit when he became tearful – ‘you did that, for me?’.
My watch had been confiscated (security?) and there was no clock in the room – I didn’t want to ask in case Dave thought I was wanting to leave, but I was trying to gauge how long we might have left, and wondering what the protocol was for the end of visits. Sure enough, the officer who had driven the van entered the room, and actually said ‘time’s up guys’! I was allowed to give Dave a hug (permitted at the beginning and end of the visit), then escorted back to the van, back to the gate, back to the visitors centre to retrieve my belongings and then made may way across the car park, past the bus taking many visitors back, I assume, to the nearest town. I’d spent nearly 3 hours with Dave, and the best part of 7 hours at the prison. I was completely drained. And starving hungry!
Getting back to Manhattan was another story, for another day, but I eventually met up with my son much later that evening and told him the tale over an excellent meal and beer in Chinatown. We stayed in the States until the following Saturday and had an amazing time, and on returning to London I was able to meet Mark and Martin for a debrief before heading home. Martin had had a Christmas card from Dave, posted since my visit – in which he’d said he’d had a great day – my visit was ‘awesome’. I’ve also had a card since then, and have written to Dave with a screenshot from the WhatsApp conversation which I hope will get through their censorship!
It’s now 2 months since my visit, and I’ve had plenty of thinking time. I am so glad that I went. Dave was – well to say pleased to see me would be an understatement. I felt that I was so near, I ‘ought’ to go, and of course, as well as the wish to see Dave, there was a professional curiosity. I was able to listen to Dave and accept what he was saying in a way that those who don’t ‘know’ the system can’t do. I can now write to him from a position of much better understanding, and support him quietly, as others do, through another few years of something I just couldn’t bear. From the professional perspective, I have always been a huge supporter of our visitors centres, and, admittedly based on only one prison – we do things much better here! Similarly, I have always wanted visits to be run compassionately, in recognition of the fact that the family are not serving a sentence (whilst not being naïve about the security risks). I have always known intellectually that domestic visitors are powerless, often not understanding processes, frequently worried about the person they are visiting – I experienced some of that and found it very hard! It’s unlikely that I’ll get the opportunity to visit Dave again – though I would take it if it came. I would just make sure I got there even earlier, with a book, and of course some doughnuts!
JENNY MOONEY
