Prison Series: Category A male prisons
Wakefield Prison:
Located in West Yorkshire, it is one of the highest security prisons. It has high-risk category A prisoners. Traditionally it was convicted of the most serious sexual offenders. The prison has a close supervision centre (CSC) holding prison systems disruptive men. It is typically for those with sentences over 10 years, lifers and prisoners with an indeterminate sentence.
Concerns:
Infrastructure was in poor condition.
There were insufficient healthcare staff, not achieving appropriate and timely care.
Lack of suitable mental health therapies and interventions. Medicine management was poor and oversight was inadequate.
There were not enough activity places to meet the needs of the prison population.
The care and management of potential vulnerabilities and risks for prisoners on their first night in prison were inadequate.
Not enough has been done to address perceived disproportionately in treatment, particularly among black and minority ethnic prisoners.
Safety: Reception was welcoming with first night safety interviews taking place. The prison had no violence reduction strategy, the analysis of data was weak and action planning was out of date. The number of recorded use of force had increased. Random mandatory drug testing and suspicion tests were completed, but the drug supply and demand strategy was not up to date. Oversight of suicide and self-harm prevention work was underdeveloped.
Rehabilitation and Release Planning: Support to reconnect, build and maintain contact with families and friends. Proactive work took place to identify and engage prisoners who did not have visits. Various departments worked to prepare and settle prisoners into long periods of prison life and reduce risk of reoffending. Offender assessment system.
Positive Practice: Body worn camera training awareness session for staff. Safeguarding board allow for deliberation about specific cases. Eligibility and outcomes of discrimination incident report forms.
Early days in Custody: Prisoners transfers to and from the prison must be safe and treated decently. Induction is comprehensive. All areas of reception have been redecorated, clean and bright area, waiting rooms being equipped. Searching procedures were proportionate and new technology was used to screen new arrivals and property.
Segregation: F wing was divided into the segregation unit, 18 cells, and has close supervision centre. Segregation unit was managed by a dedicated team of well-trained staff. Formal reintegration planning was not routine. Segregation review meetings were well attended. The regime for segregated prisoners was minimal and consisted of daily access to a telephone, caged yards and in-cell education.
Equality, Diversity And Faith Promoting equality of opportunity, eliminating unlawful discrimination and fostering good relationships. Dedicated manager coordinated equality work - championing specific protected characteristics. Lack of cultural awareness on the part of the predominantly white workforce. The prison had achieved Autism Awareness accrediation shortly after the previous inspection. The Mulberry unit accommodated and supported a small number of prisoners with autism who struggled to live on normal location. The chaplaincy had a strong multi-faith ethos. Fulfil its statutory duties and provided good care and pastoral support. Prisoners can attend weekly corporate worship, study classes and growing programme of social events.
HMP Whitemoor:
Category A prison that is for long term prisoners in a high secure unit. Complicated and inflexible, lacking routine for both prison officers and prisoners. The provision of education was poor, limited sessions and alternative learning packs delivered to cell blocks.
Procedure: Searching, controlled blocks, maintaining perimeter. Failed to pay sufficient attention to other things that motivate prisoners to behave such as predictable regime, cleanliness, access to work and education.
Fen Unit: Held up to 70 prisoners with personality disorders. Provided reliable therapy based regimes. Supporting vulnerable and risky prisoners in a calm environment.
Bridge Unit: Help for prisoners who had been previously segregated to get back onto the main wins. Improvement with well motivated staff working with challenging prisoners.
Priority Concerns:
Limited interventions and lack of purposeful activities
Reduced time out of cell - limited prisoners access to healthcare, key work and offender management
No predictable regime established
The curriculum did not meet the needs of all the prison population
Poor medicine administration had been established practice
Rehabilitation and Release Planning: Staff a limited number of social visits, video call facilities reduced and there were no in-cell telephones. Nearly all prisoners were serving long or indeterminate sentences. Reduce offending was supported by prisoner needs assessments and committee meetings. Programme delivery, engagement and completion rates were substantially low. Processes to support reintegration into the community.
Managing behaviour: Prisoners live in a safe, well ordered and motivational environment. Biggest increase in violence was attacks made against the staff. Leaders identified safety as the main priority in the prison self assessment report. Safety team was poorly resourced. For the majority of prisoners there was little or no support from key workers or prison offender managers. There was a lack of trust, no drive to encourage prisoners to improve their behaviour, and threat to order and control.
Staff and prisoner relationships: Over 2/3 prisoners are there for more than two years. 2/3 had stated that they had experienced some sort of victimisation from the staff. Fens unit, staff had good knowledge of prisoners in their care and had excellent interactions. Key work was not widely developed and adopted - despite key workers allocated few were met regularly. There is no overall strategy to promote and expand peer work, nor motivate prisoners to contribute towards this community.
HMP Frankland:
Located near Durham it is one of Englands most secure prisons. It has the highest security classification for category A prisoners. Many had committed serious, violent offences and posed great risks to the public. There is a separation unit for individuals who pose a risk against national security.
Security: Security and good order are maintained through physical and procedural matters. They are safe from exposure to substance use and effective drug supply reduction. It has rigorous physical and procedural security arrangements - electronic gates, fencing and CCTV. Comprehensive intelligence assessment to respond to new and emerging threats, identify risks and set appropriate security objectives to maintain safety.
Prisoner consultation and redress: Monthly prisoners consultative committee to improve prison processes and specific topic discussions. Central databases are used to log and track progress of complaints. 97% of complaints are handled within five days and if not there was a reason why provided to the individual. Prisoners have reasonable access to legal information and representatives - Acts of Parliament, Prison Service instructions and reference texts. Video link can be used for probation interviews and court appearances.
Primary Care: Qualified nurses completed initial comprehensive health screening of new arrivals. Prisoner access to health services was acceptable with direct telephone lines to deal with queries and requests. Healh application system for routine appointments. Primary and secondary health clinics provided - diagnostic scanning, physiotherapy, sexual health.
Until the next Legal Thought,
Elicia Maxwell
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