They put the radio on and drove me about a hundred yards from the police station to the courtroom. There were other people waiting in the cells and I felt full of fear as I was directed in, a familiar feeling of being at the centre of a buzzing electrical storm, all my senses heightened and poised for flight but unable to go anywhere.
Ash, the solicitor, was in court with me and when the magistrates retired after hearing an outline of the case I asked him if I would be able to get bail.
‘No, Stuart,’ he said, sadly. ‘You won’t be getting bail.’ ‘Why not?’
‘Because of the seriousness of the offence. I’ll apply for it, but we won’t get it. You’ll be sent straight to remand prison.’
‘But I want to go home. I want to see my mum and Tracey.’
It still hadn’t occurred to me that I wouldn’t be going home. I hadn’t imagined I would be going to prison. I had no bag and no clothes apart from a few things a friend had brought in for me. I didn’t understand how my life could have changed so suddenly and completely. The magistrates came back and I thought their spokeswoman looked a bit tearful when she told me I was going into custody. I still didn’t really understand what she was talking about. The security officer told me to come with him.
‘Where am I going, Ash?’ I asked, panic-stricken. ‘Are you coming with me?’
‘No, Stuart, I can’t come with you.’
‘Well, who’s going to come with me? Will I not be seeing my mum and Tracey?’
The guard took me to a cell and I sat down and cried, begging for help from God or Shirley or anyone else who might be listening. If I’d had the means to kill myself at that moment I probably would have tried again. The sweatbox that came to pick me up picked up other men as well. I was frightened to think I was going to be amongst real criminals, which wasn’t how I saw myself. I was just a naughty boy. This was exactly the fate that Dad had threatened me with if I ever told anyone about how bad I was and how he had to punish me.
No doubt if the other men in the van had known why I was there they would have been even more afraid of me than I was of them, particularly with my size and the physique I had built for myself in the gym. I’d wanted to make myself look intimidating in order to be invulnerable, but my appearance now made me seem a threat to others, making me even more vulnerable.
Through the tiny slit of a window in the side of the van I could see we were being driven through some big high gates. It looked like the entrance to a sports stadium. It still didn’t occur to me that I was on my way to Altcourse prison in Liverpool. As they unlocked the doors of the van a guy in the next cubicle was singing. He seemed off his head and I felt a new tremor of fear as my sweat cooled in the fresh air.
We were taken through to a room. Our handcuffs were unlocked and we were stood in line. The other guys all seemed to know what they were meant to do.
‘Next.’
It was my turn.
‘Name.’
I gave it.
‘Open your mouth.’
‘What?’
‘Open your mouth!’ the guard shouted.
I obeyed and he peered inside, inspecting my tongue, making me feel violated like I used to when Dad forced himself into my mouth.
‘Take your shoes off.’
I obeyed, stepping out of them and leaving them on the floor.
‘Do you think I’m fucking picking them up?’
‘Sorry?’
‘You heard me. Pick your fucking shoes up!’
He searched my trainers and then sent me through to the next room where all the other lads were talking as if they already knew one another. Some doors slid open and we went through into a kind of holding pen. Through a wall of bars we could see the prisoners already inside below us, at home in that hostile, frightening place. I saw a group of lads eyeing us up and down and felt a warning prickle of fear. One of them sauntered up towards me and spoke to another guy close by.
‘You’re a fucking beast, you. I know all about you.’
One of the guys in our group went up the bars and started shouting abuse at someone on the other side. The sounds of anger and raised voices stirred hundreds of fearful memories deep inside my head. I could see that I was going to have to fight my corner in this place. There was no way I was going to be allowed a quiet life unless I managed to win their respect.
They brought us some cold food and it tasted like shit. I couldn’t swallow it and one of the other lads took it off me. He didn’t seem to have any difficulty eating. As they led us further into the building, through turnstiles operated by key cards, past stacks of cells lowering over us like blocks of flats, I felt assaulted by the shouting and noise coming from every direction. Everywhere I looked I could see rows of cells with people poking their heads round the doors to see what was going on. Finally the reality hit me. I was in prison. They gave us pillowcases with our ‘plastics’ in, which meant a plastic cup, plate, bowl and cutlery, plus a blanket, sheet and pillow.
A warder told me I was up on the second floor, pointing to my cell. As I walked towards it a hand flashed out of another cell and a Scouse accent said, ‘Come in here.’
‘Am I allowed to?’
‘’Course you are.’ He pulled me into the cell with him. ‘Fucking hell, you’re a big lad, aren’t you?’
‘Yeah.’ I grinned sheepishly.
‘It would take a few of us to get you fucking down and get your trainers off you, wouldn’t it?’
‘Yeah it would,’ I agreed. ‘And I’d get every fucking one of you back.’
He started laughing, as if I’d passed some sort of test. ‘Have you got any gear?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said.
‘Do you want some?’
‘I don’t know.’ I didn’t want to offend him, but I didn’t want to do anything wrong and get into trouble with the wardens either.
‘I’ve got some weed here. Don’t worry about the fucking screws, they won’t come in here,’ I made my excuses and went to my cell.
Later I was called back down by the wardens and asked if I wanted cigarettes. I took what they gave me, having no idea they were meant to last me a week. Nothing was ever explained; you were expected to just pick things up as you went along. Next came a visit to the doctor.
‘Do you have any problems?’
‘Yes, I was abused when I was a kid and I’m frightened of being in cells with other people. I don’t like having men around me. What am I going to do about taking showers and going to the toilet?’
‘Are you on any medication?’
‘Yeah, I’m on anti-depressants.’
‘I’ll put you down as depressive and try to get someone to come and talk to you, but I don’t know how long that will be. That’s all. Thank you.’
Everything was always a direct order, and they were always using our surnames, not our first names. It was intimidating. It was like being a child again, being shouted at, told what to do, locked up in dirty, confined places.
Back on the wing it was the same confusing melee.
‘Right, lads,’ came the orders, ‘get your water and into your cells.’
They all started filling flasks with hot water, although I had no idea why. I made my way towards my allotted cell and someone intercepted me.
‘Not going in there, are you?’
‘Why not?’
‘He’s a dirty, scruffy bastard, full of crabs. You don’t want to share with him.’
I peered into my cell and saw there was someone in there exactly fitting my informant’s description. I felt a surge of panic. I couldn’t share a cell. No way would I be able to deal with that.
‘I’m not going in there,’ I told a warden.
‘Come downstairs then,’ he said. ‘I’ll put you in with another lad.’
‘No. You don’t understand. I need a room on my own.’
‘Can’t do that.’
He led me to a cell with a lad from Macclesfield already on the top bunk. Everything about it was filt
hy. We chatted for a while and then we went down for a meal and some free time before we were locked up for the night. Even though I’m a big man myself, everyone else seemed bigger, and covered with threatening-looking tattoos. I wandered about feeling completely lost and alone in an aggressive, alien world. I still thought that after a couple of days they would realize it hadn’t been my fault, that it had been Dad’s, and then they would let me out. I just had to hold on till then. That night I felt I was back in the cellar under Cranbrook Street, trapped in an uncertain world, cuddling up to a cold brick wall, listening to the clunking of doors and the jangling of keys, having no idea if they would be coming in through the door at any moment.
The bed above my head began to shake and I wondered what my cellmate was up to. Was he masturbating? Did he have any tendencies? Had he ever hurt kids? He’d told me he was in for thumping his girlfriend, but what was he really in for?
I drifted off and was woken a bit later by a loud clunk and a shake of the bunk as my neighbour got down.
I lay listening as he relieved himself and broke wind noisily
After breakfast the next morning I went back to my cell and found a prison guard waiting for me. When he turned round I was shocked to see it was Angela s brother, Adrian. He’d been working there for a couple of years but I had no idea. He was the same age as me and we’d been good friends at one time. The sight of a familiar face cracked open the facade I’d been holding up since arriving and I started to cry, which set him off. It felt like he’d come to save me.
‘Matthew loves you, you know,’ he said. ‘He’s always wanted to see you. No one blames you for this, Stuart. I know you’ve had a lot of problems but you’re a good lad. I’ll always think of you as my brother-in-law, despite what happened with Angela. You hurt her and she wants to punish you by keeping the children from you. I don’t agree with a lot of things, but I keep them to myself. Just try to hang in there, don’t get any crazy ideas. The truth will come out; everything will be OK. I’ve had to tell them here that I know you, so there’s a very good chance they’ll have to move you. But I’m going to try and pull a couple of strings — not that I’ve got many. The closest for your family would be Forest Bank in Manchester. It’s not a bad prison; it’s not a Strangeways. I’ll try to get you sent there if you have to move.’
He spent about twenty minutes with me, just talking, and I felt so much better at the end of it. I told him I wasn’t too keen on my cellmate.
‘There’s a good lad downstairs called John,’ he said. ‘I’ll get you moved down there.’
Everyone knew what I was in for, even before I got there, because it had been all over the TV and papers. I was surprised how many people came up and shook my hand, telling me I did the right thing, that they had suffered abuse when they were kids and they could understand why I’d flipped. It can’t be any coincidence that so many people who are abused during childhood end up in prison.
The next night I was still in the same cell and I heard the movements start above me again. I was afraid to speak up, but I was more afraid of sexual activity going on near me. I felt I was being terrorized.
‘I don’t know what you’re doing up there, pal,’ I blurted out, ‘but my head’s fucked here and I can’t handle stuff. If you start fucking masturbating I’ll stab your fucking arms.’
‘What you on about? I’m doing nothing.’
I felt it was important to get the upper hand quickly in prison. I wanted to be in control of what went on around me; I couldn’t handle the feeling of being out of control.
Even though the food was foul, I was still getting hungry and I worked out that you couldn’t be too late in the queue or you ran the risk of them running out of everything. When my cellmate and I went down for our tea on the second afternoon, the guy behind the serving hatch gave me a load of fish and some beans. I wanted some bread but they were down to the last loaf, the surface already littered with empty plastic wrappers. The guy in front of me picked up all that was left, a great fistful.
‘Here, pal,’ I said, ‘can I have some of that bread there?’ ‘No, that’s my bread.’
‘What do you mean, that’s your bread?’
‘It’s my bread.’
‘I want a fucking slice of bread. Give me one. You’ve got about eight slices there.’
‘No, it’s my bread.’
The thread of self-control I’d been hanging on to snapped. I hurled my plate of food at the wall and booted the guy, screaming and shouting like a madman. Everyone else averted their eyes and moved away. Eventually I turned and walked away, shouting, ‘Fucking wankers! I hate this fucking place!’
I sat down at one of the far tables, put my head in my hands and wept. It all seemed so unfair. I didn’t think I’d done anything wrong and I had been thrown into this system without having anything explained to me. I was entitled to a life and they were trying to take mine away from me. I was a man now; I didn’t have to take it like I did when I was a kid.
I sensed someone was approaching and looked up. It was one of the screws. ‘Here, lad,’ he said, giving me some tobacco, ‘get yourself a smoke.’
I was puzzled as to why I was being rewarded for bad behaviour. Another guy appeared behind him and I recognized him as being from the servery. He was carrying a plate loaded with the biggest pile of food I’d ever seen, far more than they had had in their serving dishes a few minutes before.
‘Here, pal, get that down yer neck.’
I guess word about my past had started to spread around the wing and people were beginning to feel sympathy for me. From then on I was constantly being told by other prisoners that they didn’t think I should be in there. The funny thing about prison is that although everyone is always claiming they’re innocent of whatever they’ve been convicted of, other prisoners and screws always assume everyone is guilty. So it was a great boost to me that so many of them didn’t think I deserved to be inside.
That night I was swapped around to be with John, who turned out to be a good guy. We had two separate beds instead of bunk beds and a much bigger cell. There was a proper private area for the toilet and everything was much cleaner. I felt far more relaxed. John was very open and seemed happy to talk about virtually anything.
On the third afternoon I was there Tracey managed to get in to see me. I’d been missing her so much it was like a physical pain. Seeing her lifted all the worries off my heart and I just stood there, hugging her, crying and telling her how sorry I was about the way things had turned out. The fresh start we’d been planning in Wales now seemed a distant memory. I was also beginning to worry about how young and inexperienced Ash Halam was. After all, he was just a duty solicitor, and I was beginning to grasp that this was going to be a murder trial. I felt I wanted to have someone who’d handled cases like mine before. I asked Tracey to ask around and she came back with a man called Padhee Singh, who was with the biggest firm of solicitors in Manchester.
She told me about the press coverage, which had been just as sensational as you would expect — the journalists describing the respectable old council worker in Wales whose stepson had driven over from Manchester and battered him to death. Even the local Mayor and Mayoress had come forward to have their pictures taken and to vouch for what a respectable member of the community Dad was. The fact that he’d been to prison for abusing Christina and Shirley seemed to have been forgotten. They wanted him to be the innocent victim in the story, and me the brutal young murderer in the black BMW.
My new cellmate John suggested I get a job, so I wouldn’t have to spend so much time banged up in the cell. There was a lady officer on and I asked her if she had any jobs going.
‘Yeah,’ she said, you can get all these behind their doors now, it’s bang-up.’
‘Is that a job, yeah?’
‘Yeah.’
I started walking round like a kid asking people to get behind their doors, not having a clue that she had just made it up on the spot: because I was a big guy she was using
me to do her job for her. People were sticking their heads out. ‘Get your heads behind the doors,’ I told them, in all innocence, having no idea just how dangerous it was. The funny thing was, they did do what I said. I guess my size, coupled with the fact that they knew I’d hammered a man to death, was giving me the upper hand I’d already realized I needed.
John gave me some good bits of advice. ‘You need to stop calling the screws “sir” all the time, pal,’ he said. ‘You’re sticking out a bit.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, nobody’s going to have a go at you because look at the size of you, but it would be better to call them “boss”.’
‘Why?’
‘You just don’t call them “sir”. They’re no better than you. They call you by your second name, don’t they?’
He also told me there was a gym where we could go for an hour every so often and I signed up. As soon as I got there I could see there wasn’t enough equipment to go round and I ran over to a bench. Another guy put his hand on it at the same time.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked.
‘I’m here,’ he said.
‘I just got here.’
‘No you didn’t.’
I shoved him. ‘Look, pal, you want to start something here you’re gonna come off second best, but if you want to work with me we’ll train together.’
For a second it looked like it was going to develop into a fight, but then he moved away and did something else. All the time there was this volatile feeling in the air, like things could explode at any moment.
The lack of privacy was hard. Even though I was comfortable with John, it would alarm me when he would just drop his trousers in front of me without any self-consciousness; it brought back bad memories — just like the way the sound of a man clearing his throat of phlegm, preparing to spit, reminded me of Dad spitting into his hand to lubricate himself when he masturbated or penetrated me. When I had gone to the gym on the outside I had always made sure I changed before I went and came home to shower. It had always been a problem, even at school. I never wanted to shower with the other guys. Nakedness frightened me and I didn’t take a shower all the time I was in Altcourse because there was no privacy. People used to shit in the showers too, because some of the heroin addicts weren’t able to control their bowels.
Please, Daddy, No: A Boy Betrayed Page 13
