by Jim Dawkins
That incident, as I have said, was almost at the end of my tour in the Category A unit, and in September 1994 I was to be redeployed to the externals group responsible for escorting prisoners to and from the courts and other prisons. I had not really wanted to leave the unit, as I had become confident in carrying out the duties involved there and enjoyed building a good working relationship with most of the inmates on it. However, the Prison Service policy was that, due to possible conditioning, members of staff would not be allowed to do more than two years there before being moved to another area. I was lucky to get the post with externals, as it was a much sought after position and I still did not fancy the prospect of working on the house blocks.
The man who ran the office for the externals group was Dave Bartlett, and over the next few months we were to become good friends. He was a very laid-back sort of man and believed in the give-and-take method of working. By that I mean that if you had finished your escort early and he had nothing else for you to do he would tell you to bugger off quick before someone else found you something to do. That was how we worked then. Some days you would not get back to the nick until ten o'clock at night, but the next day you might have finished by twelve.
The best job on the list was the Inner London Crown Court run, where we would take a vanload of inmates up for their daily appearances. Although this particular duty meant you would not return to the prison before five, once you had handed your inmates over to the court staff the rest of the day was yours. I got on really well with the two auxiliary drivers of the vans, Del and Andy, and in no time at all we had set ourselves a nice little routine for inner London runs.
We would get to the court as quickly as possible, which meant that I had to collect and push my inmates through the reception process and onto the van as fast as possible. Then it was over to Del or Andy to use their knowledge of the London roads to get us to the court by the fastest route possible through the rush-hour traffic. Once at the court, the unload was carried out as quickly as the load, and as soon as all the inmates were secured and my paperwork was complete we were off.
The only thing that would impede our escape was if a member of staff at the court had gone sick and the PO needed to use an escort officer to man one of his docks. In the event of this happening, our contingency plan would be that Del or Andy would ring the court office from the cellphone in their van and pretend to be the prison with an additional job for the van and the escort officer. It was important that you were the first van there for this plan to work, as if a second van had pulled up then the PO could have decided that they could do the additional run.
The additional run was always the same every morning, straight out of inner London and straight into Tower Bridge Police Station for one of their famous 999 full English breakfasts. Once we had spent an hour or two in the police canteen, we would return to the court after a phone call to ensure that they had sorted out any staffing problems. We would then park the van and disappear over to the Rose and Crown for a liquid lunch.
We would usually leave the pub at about two thirty and make a beeline for the delicatessen to get a hot chicken escalope to help soak up the three or four pints we had just consumed. We would then stagger in through the legal visits entrance back down to the cells where we would grab an hour or two's sleep to sober up before our return trip to Belmarsh.
How I managed never to have lost any prisoners by the end of the day is beyond me. I can only be thankful that none of them ever fucked around too much when we were loading them on the van. By that time of day the majority had had a gutful of sitting in court all day and just wanted to get back to their cell and relax, so they took little notice of the half pissed escort staff. In fact I think most of them enjoyed travelling with me as I always sat in the front of the van, which was taboo when you had prisoners on board, but I piped the van's radio through the intercom so they could listen to the music in the back.
When I was not on the road, most of my time at Belmarsh was spent in reception where inmates came as their first and last port of call as they went in and out of the prison. The place was almost always chaotic and seemed to have a constant stream of prisoners and staff flying around. Reception also had to accommodate escort staff from other prisons, and it was here one day that I first came across some staff from Wormwood Scrubs. I heard them mention my old pal Charlie Bronson in their conversation with the reception SO so decided to join in.
They were not, however, speaking highly of him as I had hoped, and two of them in particular were commenting on how we at Belmarsh pandered to his every need. When I heard the same two bragging that they were directly involved with the vicious beating he received while on a previous visit to the Scrubs, I was disgusted and felt I had to get involved with the conversation to stick up for my pal.
At first I let them describe in detail how they gathered the biggest bully boys on duty down the seg to await Charlie's arrival with the calculated plan of giving him a good kicking to teach him what he would get if he fucked about at that prison. This practice is not unique to the Scrubs and goes on in almost every prison in the country at some stage or another. The Scrubs, however, as I was to find out later, was one of the worst offenders in terms of such brutal welcoming committees.
The pair went on to describe how they had taken all their chains and watches off and had lain in wait in one of the strip cells until the escort bringing Charlie had left. Then they went into the cell where Charlie was and before he had a chance to do anything they all attacked him. Charlie is still pursuing the assault all these years later, but it is proving very difficult for his legal team to break through the wall of silence that the Prison Service puts up in all these cases to protect the bullying element within their ranks. The assault on Charlie at Scrubs, like so many before and after, was totally unprovoked and vicious.
The two officers that claimed to be involved described how they tore out lumps of hair from his trademark moustache and smashed his fingers and hands with their feet and truncheons. All the time they were describing the incident they were smiling and seemed to be very proud of their involvement. They then went on to describe the officers whom they had heard about who had looked after Charlie whilst he was at Belmarsh and how they thought they were all cowards due to the fact that they had not beaten Charlie up.
This was the point during the conversation that I blew up and began screaming at them that I was one of those officers. I was livid and it took a couple of members of staff to prevent me from smacking them right in their smug little faces and exacting some revenge for Charlie's treatment. I told them that both I and the other officers who worked with Charlie were all far better men than they could hope to be. I left them with one final thought that Charlie is like an elephant -he never forgets, and one way or another all ten or more of those involved in that attack would get their comeuppance.
It is people like that who are the cowards. They would not have dreamt of having a go at Charlie or any other prisoner unless they had a gang of other like-minded bullies behind them to back them up. It is just this type of officer that gives the decent ones a bad name and makes the difficult job of being a prison officer even more difficult. Unfortunately, they are looked upon as idols by many other members of staff, who in turn often get involved with the bullying in an attempt to gain the respect they crave from these sorts of officers. I never looked upon them as anything less than cowards, and it was the fact that I was working alongside them and hated the feeling that people would think I was like them that made me ultimately take the decision to leave the Prison Service.
By this stage of my career, I had made good friends with a couple of decent officers. My main partner in crime was Geordie P and we spent many good nights in various pubs and clubs around London. On one particular night out we went to the Queen Vic in Belvedere to watch a live group perform. The pub was packed by the time we arrived after our twelve-hour A shift, and before long we had
attracted a small group of young girls who flirted round us all night. They could only have been barely eighteen and we were not interested, but we chatted to them when they came to our table just out of courtesy. The interest they were showing to us had, however, drawn us to the attention of a group of rowdy young lads who appeared to be with the same crowd as these young girls. One of them, a tall boy with a baseball cap, staggered into our table and started gobbing off that they were his birds and if we did not stop talking to them he would do us. I told him to piss off and drink his lemonade and called him a silly little boy. He was most upset by this and tried to grab me but was restrained by the girls who took him back to the rest of his gang.
Shortly afterwards, two of the girls came back over and were looking really worried. One of them explained that the boy I had upset was the 'hardest boy' in Orpington and he said he was going to stab me after the pub shut. She offered to distract the gang long enough for me to get out of the pub. I thanked her for her concern, but explained that I had never run away from trouble before and was not really worried about some 'Kevin', the teenager wanting to have a go at me. The rest of the evening went by without further incident apart from the 'intimidating' stares we received from Kevin and his gang.
As we left the pub Kevin shouted "All screws are wankers" to us but made no attempt to follow as we left. It was not until we had crossed the road and were making the important decision whether to have a Chinese or kebabs that the gang of about five kids came charging out of the pub and up the road. They spotted us on the other side and Kevin made a beeline straight for me. As he approached, I again told him not to be a silly boy and to go home before his mum got worried about him. With that, he pulled his arm out of his jacket and was clutching a very large black diver's-type knife in his right hand. This was now serious and I had to disarm this kid before he got hurt. I was laughing in my head as I remembered a recent episode of Coronation Street when Jim McDonald assaulted a burglar with a crowbar only to find out he was a minor, and Jim nearly ended up inside. With this in mind, I knew I could not afford to hurt him too much, so remembering my unarmed combat from years before I grabbed his knife hand. As I did this I instinctively pushed the fingers of my free hand into his throat, causing him to drop the knife and fall to the ground gasping for breath.
I picked the knife up, straddled his body, put the blade across his throat and told him never to pull a knife out unless he has got the bottle to use it. Overcoming my urge to stick him with his own weapon, I got up, pulled him off the ground and, with a swift kick up his arse, sent him crying down the road. Geordie, in the meantime, had another member of the gang in a neck hold when I noticed a third boy pull out a small lock knife and run over to where Geordie was. I intercepted him with a flying kick in his back that sent him hurtling over a garden wall.
The incident was over quickly, and once the boys had run off we disposed of their knives down a drain in the road. Someone had called the Old Bill and we decided that we should wait and give our side of the story before they got a different version from the gang of boys. In short, we spent the next four hours being interviewed at Belvedere Police Station about the incident.
To our surprise the case came up at Croydon Crown Court almost a year later and we were called to give evidence. It turned out that my Jim McDonald theory had been correct as the boys were only sixteen, a fact that their defence team referred to a great deal while cross-examining our evidence. I could not believe the sight as I entered the witness box and saw these two angelic-looking schoolboys all dressed up in their best suits and giving the jury their best puppy-dog eyes. Geordie and I somehow had to explain to the court that these little angels had attacked a pair of big ruftytufty prison officers.
We did manage to convince them but made it clear that, whilst we thought they should learn for their own sake that they should not go round with knives picking fights at their age, they should not receive a prison sentence. The judge listened to our mitigation on their behalf and awarded them some sixty hours' community service, which, at the age they were, would have been a hard enough lesson I hope.
My relationship with Jackie at that time was getting worse despite the fact that the birth of our daughter, Lauren, on 20 February 1994 had given us a bit of renewed hope. I began spending more time out drinking and eventually Jackie had taken all she could and we decided the only way forward for her was for us to split up. By November 1995 I had left our house in Sidcup and had moved into the grim prison flats in Brockley, nicknamed Heartbreak Hotel.
I had not really thought about my feelings until I was sitting on my bed in my new room staring at the three bin liners that contained my worldly possessions. I had rung Jackie to arrange to collect my stereo and could hear Lauren crying in the background. The sound of my eighteen-monthold baby girl crying tore me apart, as I realized that I would never again be able to put her to bed each night and get her up each morning. I thought at that point that I would miss out on so much of her growing years and might even lose touch with her altogether. Luckily that has not been the case and I have always maintained regular contact with her, and when we do see each other we have a great time. She has grown up so much over the years and is now doing well at school and has turned out to be a real little character in her own right. Those of you that have kids will agree that they are the best thing that could happen to you and I never tire of watching them, although they do grow up too fast so every moment is precious.
Shortly after my separation I began to go a little off the rails and began to hit the drink a bit too much. I started to become a regular feature at all the functions and you could always rely on me to liven up the party a bit. I added a little too much life to one such party and the consequences could have cost me my job.
At the time a civilian catering firm ran the officers' mess and I was invited to the mess manageress's leaving party, which was held at a pub in Thamesmead. On the day of the party I was not working, so began drinking at lunchtime as I slowly made my way to the venue. By the time I had arrived, I was well on my way to getting the prize for being the most pissed person there. I met up with a group of fellow officers, but shortly after arriving we noticed an unwanted guest in our midst. Wandering around and telling us that we had drunk enough was a certain governor who shall remain nameless, but those of you who have dealt with him will know who he is when I say he had a dicky bow on as usual. Some of our group took great offense to this man's interference with our love of lager, and it was decided that something had to be done. I was nominated as the one to go and tell him to leave, as his presence was no longer required.
I staggered over to him and basically told him that he was upsetting the other guests so we wanted him to piss off. He agreed and stated that he was about to leave anyway as he was ashamed to be seen in our company. Pleased that my task had been carried out with apparent ease, I returned to the group only to hear some alarming news. Scouse informed me that as I had walked away the governor had gestured something behind my back and had not left but in fact had just moved to another position in the pub.
Furious that he had ignored my warning, I went back over to him and asked him why he had not gone. He made some sarcastic remark which, in my inebriated state, I felt left me with only one option. I gave him a cracker of a right-hander, which did not have its usual effect due to the fact that I could see three of him and tried to hit the one in the middle. It was, however, effective enough to make him leave and cause everyone else to stare on in disbelief.
The rest of the evening went well until I had obviously had enough and went outside to throw up in some bushes. Whilst doing so I lost my false tooth and, despite scouring the area on my hands and knees, it appeared that the tooth fairy was too quick for me as I never found it. My memories after that point are a blank and the next thing I remember was waking up in a strange room the following morning.
I awoke wrapped in an army-issue sleeping bag on a top bunk bed
, and as I tried to remember where I was I looked around the room for clues. Scattered all over the floor of this strange room was an array of martial arts stretching equipment. In my bewildered state I thought I had been captured by a gang of triads and immediately checked to see if I still had my boxer shorts on. Thankfully I did and they were still on the right way round, so I was fairly confident that my kidnappers had not gang-raped me. It turned out to be 'steady' Eddie's house, who was a fellow Green Jacket as well as an officer at Belmarsh. He had found me asleep outside the pub and had taken me back to his place for the night.
I made my way into work only to discover that I had no uniform other than a spare pair of trousers in my locker. As a result I had to struggle through the day with a bright blue key chain, a belt with 'loan belt' engraved in large letters on the back and wearing a female officer's blouse, which I had borrowed from another friend, Tracy. You can imagine the stick I got from other members of staff, let alone the inmates.
I was still oblivious to what had really gone on the night before, although I had that feeling you get after a night out that something serious had happened. It was the way in which everyone I came across gave me that look while shaking their heads and tutting at me that made me worry more. It was not until I passed the telephone exchange that Kim came out and asked if I was on my way to apologize to the governor for my behaviour the night before. After she had explained what I had done, I spent the next few days waiting for the summons to his office to get the sack. I have got to give the man his due though. He did not take the matter any further, although he did make a meal out of it every time he had to pull me up about anything in the future. That incident occurred right at the end of my time with externals. With the new privatization of all the courts looming, there was only a requirement for about four permanent officers to remain on the externals group. Maybe the governor incident had something to do with the fact that I was not chosen to stay, who knows, but I was once again to be redeployed and this time it was to one of the house blocks.