A former prisoner who spent two years in jail for fraud has said the current custodial system appears to be “designed to maximise reoffending” and destroy “human potential.”
David Shipley, a former inmate who is calling for reform to our prison system, said, “The reality is, it’s almost nothing like the popular media portrayals of it.”
He said: “I committed a fraud. I lied to some investors in a company we were all talking about setting up together. And I then produced sort of fake documents to support that lie.”
Mr. Shipley said four years past, and then in 2018 the police contacted him and interviewed him on the record.
“I felt quite relieved in a strange way, and I confessed,” he said, subsequently pleading guilty in court and being sentenced, in Feb. 2020, to 45 months in prison.
Mr. Shipley said: “I didn’t expect prison to be a nice environment. But I was horrified, and still am horrified at how bad the English prison system is. I firmly believe if we were trying to design a system to maximise reoffending, and to destroy as much human potential as possible, we would be hard-pressed to beat the existing system.”
Mr. Shipley now writes, speaks and advocates for improving the prison system and is studying for a PhD at Southampton University, looking at the impact of parental imprisonment on children.
He said before he was remanded in custody, Mr. Shipley had the idea that prisons were full of “violence and sexual violence” and were “awash with drugs.”
But he said while there were a lot of drugs in prison, he found most of the violence was linked to “gang activity” and “turf wars,” and those who were most likely to get hurt were those who had narcotics debts.
Noise Adds to ‘Psychological Toll’ on Prisoners
Mr. Shipley said prison was also an incredibly noisy environment with the constant banging of doors, slamming of gates, rattling of keys, shouting and stomping.He believed the noise adds to the, “psychological and spiritual toll” prison takes on people.
Mr. Shipley said he did not believe in abolishing prison and he said it needed to be the ultimate punishment for those who have convicted crimes.
But he said the prison system needed to “teach the right lessons” and he said it also needed to massively improve its provision of health care.
He said, “In prison, health care is withheld until a moment of crisis.”
“He had some sort of cardiac issue, a breathing issue, he collapsed on the wing. And the officers prevented other prisoners from giving him CPR or any kind of first aid attention, put all the prisoners who were out back in their cells, and then proceeded to stand around this man, waiting for paramedics,” he added.
The Shock of Being Released
He also believes jails are not doing enough to prepare prisoners for their release back into society.“I imagined something very filmic, like an American prison film, the great gate opening, and you walk out into the future, and it’s nothing like that, particularly for me, because I was released from open prison,” said Mr. Shipley.
“Throughout our prison sentences, prisoners often believe we are going to have this great joyful moment of release. And actually, it’s much more complicated than that. And I speak to lots of men who I got to know in prison, or talk to people on Twitter and it’s very common, this experience. We’ve expected it to be this experience of absolute joy, I’m released, it’s over. And actually, it can be quite difficult,” he added.
Mr. Shipley said there could be a lot of sadness and negative emotions and huge anxiety about ordinary chores like paying bills and buying groceries.
“I suspect part of what I do, in writing about prison, talking about prison, going to inspect prisons, to get a PhD around imprisonment ... I think that’s my way of coping. I think everyone who’s been to prison has to find ways of resolving and healing from that,” he added.
