DATA ANALYSIS > CONCLUSION > Page 23

Sitting, talking to this articulate, clear-thinking 78 year old I can only reflect that if you didn't know he had been wrongfully imprisoned for over 21 years, you couldn't tell it from his manner. There is no suppressed rage, no obvious bitterness, no deep sadness just below the surface and he doesn't have that haunted look so common amongst 'miscarriage of justice' victims.

  However, it has left its mark. "I've always been bitter, because they've taken the best part of my life away, although I don't show it...I'm sensible enough to know that bitterness doesn't get you anywhere....I still go through it every day....I don't lose any sleep, but I do get angry at times. You have to take life as it is and you've got to get on with it"

  So is it all a question of self-control? "I'm not haunted by it. It's a matter of your personality, your inner feelings, whether you can control yourself. If you can control your own mind, you're alright."

 ANALYSIS

It is clear from the accounts given by the control group that initially they had every bit as hard a time of it as the sample group. In fact, it could be argued that they had a worse time of it, because they also had to suffer the trauma of actually committing a horrendous offence. John's hair turned white over night; Peter was "numb with shock" and Jack had been living such a "nightmare existence" that he actually felt comparatively better after committing the offence. I myself was caught in the throes of a deep depression for many months.

  Very soon though, all of us settled down into some kind of routine and came to terms with our sentences. Even though I constantly tried to escape, this was a reaction against being locked up rather than against being wrongfully convicted. All of us knew in our hearts that we deserved to be where we were. There was no injustice involved.

  All of the control group emerged from prison with little enduring psychological damage and managed to reintegrate themselves into society very quickly. Now, many years after release, all look back on the experience as relatively benign, if quite painful at the time.

  For the sample group the horror started from the day they were arrested, continued throughout their sentences and persists even now, several years after they have been officially cleared. Apart from Maynard and Dudley, all have suffered and continue to suffer major psychological problems that have thoroughly diminished any pleasure they might have felt at finally being cleared. It would be true to say that they feel the experience has ruined their lives and will continue to do so.

CONCLUSION

There is abundant evidence that human beings are affected by their environment, whether it be by the mechanism of "dynamic interchange" (p.5) as described by Ittleson, Rivlin, Proshansky and Winkel (1974) or by some less interactive method. And if they are going to be affected by any environment, then they are most surely going to be affected by prison, that harshest of human environments so eloquently described by Toch.(1979, 1992). However, the point at issue here is how deeply the individual will be affected, and will the effects be lasting and, perhaps, irreversible?