CONCLUSION > RECOMMENDATIONS > Page 26

When pressed for an explanation of how he had re-adapted so well, with so little obvious psychological damage, Maynard suggested that it was a function of his having been a professional criminal. As a professional criminal he had expected to go to prison. He even went so far as to say that, had he been framed for the sort of crime that he had actually committed, though not been caught for, he could have fully accepted it. Dudley certainly shared the 'professional criminal's' outlook too.

 So perhaps that was it, then. Even though Kamara had done a four and a half year sentence for armed robbery and Rowe and Davis had both served short sentences for minor crimes, perhaps it was the fact that Maynard and Dudley had considered themselves to be professional criminals (with all the mindset that went with that) that prevented the latter pair from suffering enduring psychological harm. I wasn't really convinced.

  Then I realised something that had not fully registered with me before. Both Maynard and Dudley had been released from prison in the conventional way that most long term prisoners are released. They had gone through the whole procedure of open prison, town visits, working outside, home leaves, working on the hostel scheme and finally release. It was after they had been released that they had been cleared.

  Talking of the release procedure, Cohen and Taylor (1972) say, "there is much attention in ordinary prisons to preparing the inmate for this transition:- vocational training, half-way hostels, pre-release programmes". They also refer to, "the psychological 'bends' the men will face as they re-surface."

  Apocryphal tales abound of the old lag who has served all his sentence in a closed prison only to refuse to leave on the final day due to an inordinate fear of freedom itself. There are very few 'frills' in prison. The Prison authorities do not waste money on things that have no proven, practical worth. The pre-release procedure is expensive, in terms of both staff time and prison resources. It is there for a good reason.

 When I am asked what my first day of freedom was like after more than twenty years inside, I always ask in return what day they are referring to. Is it my first 'town walk' with the Governor; my first 'town walk' on my own; my first day 'working outside'; my first day with my mother on home leave or even my first day on the hostel scheme? It most certainly wasn't that last day when they finally signed the paper and let me go.

  For the average long term prisoner, freedom is a lengthy procedure rather than an event. For 'miscarriage of justice' victims it is an event, and a cataclysmic one at that. Except for Maynard and Dudley, all were taken from their cells in a closed prison and released within hours. What a supreme irony it would be if the very thing they yearned for so many years, immediate freedom, was the very thing that did them enduring psychological harm.

RECOMMENDATIONS

I would make three recommendations:-

 1)  that a 'retreat' be funded and set up by the Home Office for 'miscarriage of justice' victims immediately they are released, as suggested by John Kamara in his 'Life After Life' proposal and as supported by Dr Adrian Grounds. Specifically, that it should be staffed with other 'miscarriage of justice' victims, who understand their special needs and to whom they could relate.

 2)  that all inmates be prevented from spending inordinately long periods in solitary confinement. There is abundant evidence in the literature of the psychological damage that even partial sensory deprivation can do. With regard to 'miscarriage of justice' applicants who meet certain criteria (eg. an appeal campaign; continuing disobedience, long periods of self-isolation), perhaps units could be set up wherein they could have special access to law books, lawyers, telephones, etc and anything that could aid their appeal campaign. In these units they could socialise with other 'miscarriage of justice' applicants and perhaps avoid the harm that the long years of isolation do.

 3)  that a long term programme of research be established to determine the psychological effects, enduring or otherwise, suffered by 'miscarriage of justice' victims.