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Graham Smith
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Graham Mumby-Croft


John Dring
1945 - 2021

Obituary by Tim Newell

​John’s prison interest came from a series of accidents. Having had a difficult time at school and university he joined the RAF in 1967 but realised it was not a long-term prospect for him. He finished his degree in sociology and having married Jenny in 1969 they were looking for a house. An attraction of the service was that a house was then provided. So, he joined the Prison Service.
Prison Service College, Love Lane. In 1970 he was tutored by Al Papps and Jim Perriss. Ralph Skrine was Deputy Principal and Reg Llewellyn then in charge. John felt the course did not really equip him for working with staff and prisoners, with nothing on management skills or working with the POA.

At the end of the staff course he asked to be posted to Oxford, a local prison or borstal in the south. He was posted to Strangeways! Under Captain Davies, rigid in his ways but well respected by staff for his clear leadership. John got on well with him. People he worked with there included Bill Martin who was Dep, providing a good balance to the governor. Other governor grades included Mike Jenkins, and Don McColl. There were occasional incidents of brutality and in the Borstal Allocation Centre one brave officer came forward to tell of an incident as a result of which others went to court and were convicted. Other colleagues included Colin Richardson, Derek Myers, Denis Appleton and Ron Bonacorsi.

On his next move he asked for a borstal in the south and was sent to Wellingborough working with Joe Green and Mike Watson Jackson, John Morrison, Peter Gibbs and Tony Sykes. Wellingborough was a big borstal and John was in charge of one wing. Early on in his time at Wellingborough John had to tell his SO not to touch inmates when during an inspection he had cuffed a lad for untidiness in John’s presence. He wanted his staff to know that he would not tolerate brutality. Knowing that two officers from Manchester Borstal Allocation Centre were serving sentences for having hit lads he felt he had to draw a line soon. At Wellingborough John worked with matrons, a sympathetic role in Borstals at that time. The one on his wing seemed to attract a few lads particularly in the evenings. John worked the traditional housemaster split shifts of mornings and evenings. This enabled him to look after his children including his new born daughter, Sarah, whilst Jenny obtained her PGCE which led to her significant career in teaching. John would see the Borstal boys in the evenings when he would do casework with them.
John Dring
Tim Newell with John Dring
Farewell to Wellingborough and he moved on promotion as an AG1 tutor to the Officer Training School at Leyhill. In 1977 the family moved into a J type quarter, no central heating and no phone. There was slow service from the Works Department which was centred on the prison. The call box on the corner was much used. The OTS was a good opportunity to learn more about the prison service and being an officer. Some good POs lived nearby. John lectured and introduced a module on mental health as well as lecturing on social development, traditionally done by AGs.
An event of note was the visit of the Queen on the centenary of the Prison Service in 1978. John was part of the bodyguard for her and all went well. He described the preparation steps taken and the desecration of a Victorian orangery, the Works Department taking all the glass out as it would have been too expensive to repair!

Some of the people John served with at Leyhill included Jim Webley, principal, Brian McCluckie, Steve Twinn and John May. The setting of the school was impressive in Tortworth Court. While at Leyhill, John trained as a tutor at Sunningdale. He left the OTS in 1981 after five good years.
He moved to Leicester as Deputy Governor and there worked with Bryan Payling whom he found well- informed and very helpful. Leicester was a small local but with a special security wing for high-risk men, many organised within the IRA hierarchy. An incident with steel lockers showed how high the security risk was with a group planning escape all the time. The reputation of the horrific incident of the Hughes escape when two people were murdered was often a reminder of Leicester. The POA was getting militant and had gone to the gate on a few occasions. But luckily there were some good Principal Officers who countered the worst elements of the action such as refusing late escorts, which soon stopped. Industrial relations were well handled by the governor John Richardson and Bryan Payling who ‘kept on talking’. John Richardson was succeeded by Bob Mole. He was physically courageous and John as his Dep worked well with him. One weekend John had an incident with a desperately aggressive man who was also self-harming and he ordered that he be put in a body- belt and insisted on the doctor coming in. John reported it to the Governor on the Monday. Bob was pleased and said “I had my doubts about you but you’ll do for me!”

Richard Tilt was governor of nearby Bedford and John did deals with him over transfers. When Richard moved to HQ, he asked John to join him on the Manpower Team. He was promoted to Governor 3 and moved there in 1983.There were some excellent staff working with him, like John Cann and Mick Connolly, Alan Davies, Paddy Fitzgerald and Colin Lambert. They talked frankly to staff meetings and POA committees. In measuring the work, it was clear that many places were grossly understaffed. Dealing with the POA at national level Philip Mawer led the work with Fresh Start and the advice of PA consultants. It was a critical time for the Service.

John went on a G2 Board at the age of 39 – unusually young – he was successful and was moved to Featherstone Prison. The Regional Director John Sandy, who had opened Featherstone, seemed to have a soft spot for the prison which ran well. It was a complicated multi-functional industrial prison with good facilities. John lived in digs for the time there. Sean O’Neill was the Dep and John Morrison and Tom Mason, some of the AGs. The prison made cell doors and army tank parts, prison shirts and had a good woodwork workshop. He was soon fed up with being in lodgings and asked Brian Emes for a move. He offered John Aylesbury which pleased him but the deal was he had to do workshops for Governors from Newbold on Fresh Start before taking up command.

In 1988 John eventually had a three-day handover from Toby Newth at Aylesbury and sadly there was an escape on the last day! It was clear that poor control of scaffolding had enabled the escape to take place. Two weeks later there was a riot at the weekend and John was called in. Fortunately, the lads soon ran out of steam and went behind their doors. There was local press attention and the Regional Director, John Sandy became concerned. John told him the prison was very under-resourced and without more staff it was likely that there would be further trouble. The prison soon became better staffed and resourced. The regime became more suitable for a training environment. John introduced:


  •   Yoga with the Prison Phoenix Trust,

  •   Toyota started an apprentice workshop which led to Toyota garage employment,

  •   The Education Officer developed a wider programme with choice.

  •   The Personal Officer scheme was developed and staff had to commit to talking to inmates.

  •   Bryan Payling took over as Deputy. He found papers in the Deps office that showed many issues and petitions had not been dealt with over the years!

  •   Princess Anne visited as the Braille Workshop had won an award from the Butler Trust

  •   The Chaplain, Harry Potter introduced opera classes


Regime development involves complexity and a range of activities.

In 1990 John was promoted to Governor1 and replaced John Staples at Newbold Revel Prison Service College. This was a big responsibility with 10 Regional training units. The fallout from Strangeways and then the Woolf Report called for much new training such as Emergency Control Room and Command Courses.
He was 6 years at the College (1990 -1996). So much was happening at the time. Parkhurst and Whitemoor, security horrors! John produced a Prison Service Training Plan, the first one ever. He visited all parts of the estate and had to have a mobile phone fitted into his car, one of the first.
When Area Managers became graded as Assistant Directors John was boarded and took over from Arthur de Frisching who luckily left Jim Gomersall in the team. John managed eleven governors such as Marjorie Boon (Woodhill), Sarah Payne (Bullingdon) Paul Mainwaring (Huntercombe), William Payne (Reading), Ed Willetts, (Bedford), Tim Newell (Grendon and Springhill), Mick Knight (Littlehey), Bob Perry (Gartree), Nick Pascoe at Aylesbury and Nick Brooke at Onley.
John worked under Alan Walker Operations Director South, for four years, while Al Papps was Ops Director North.
Issues of the Area included failures to agree, and financial problems of control. The incoming Labour government transformed young offender processes to good effect.

John was Gold commander during a sensitive time in 1999 and was contacted to say that Jenny his wife had had a seizure. He could not leave his post and then realised that he would have to leave the job. He retired in June 2000.
Jenny was seizure-free for some time in which they had some good holidays, and visited Australia with family. There were many periods of remission but sadly Jenny died in 2013, after a 17-year diagnosis.

In retirement John was very busy with prison-related enterprises. John was involved with mentoring senior governors in 2011, and he had been a trustee of the Prison Phoenix Trust since 2001 and chair of Kids VIP, which he was able to hand over to Mitch Egan. He was also working with Assessment Centres for Police, Fire Service and with the Prison Service.
John had prostate cancer in 2001, and did well through the treatment. He has had many sporting interests including tennis (through Midori his second wife). In 2010 Simon was doing the Thame Triathlon - 16 lengths, 12-mile bike ride and 5km run and he gave John an entry for the next year as a Christmas present, which John completed.

In 2017 he was putting up curtains at home and found he could not raise his arms. He was tested and after some time diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease. The shock and stress were massive, he said he went cold. There are some 5000 people affected at present in the country and many die within 4 to 5 years. The deterioration can be slow but is remorseless. However, he decided that nobody likes a moaner so had taken the conscious decision each day to do what he could do that day. He took control of his diagnosis.

John played bridge four days a week, he watched opera every night and visited Bayreuth for a memorable occasion. He was a member of the MND Association, which met up regularly to share experience and discuss research and equipment. He had been helped by his doctor and by NHS Continuing Health Care.

John continued to the end to be interested in prison matters, in news of colleagues and current issues. A friend to many, much missed.