Treatment of mentally ill prisoner unlawful and inhumane

We have just written to the Governor of a prison about one of our clients who is 17 years old. We say:

“It is well known that our client has profound mental health problems and has exhibited difficult and challenging behaviour throughout her present sentence and placements at a secure training centre and other prisons…We would of course reiterate, it is her untreated condition, not the person, who is causing this difficulty.”

Included in the letter are extracts from her diary. Just a couple of days from last week give a flavour:

“I was about to eat some fruit salad when one of the other girls shouted to me that they had poisoned the salad. Things in my head started going on and I thought the staff could hear the voices and I got my radio and smashed it so that it would make noise and then the staff could not hear the voices in my head. It didn’t help. The officers then came in to restrained me and took me to the ISR to calm down. I didn’t know where to stand or what to do. I didn’t know whether to walk as this thing was in my head still going on. I simply felt there was no progress. So when the staff came in and told me nothing would get better I became uncontrollably angry and threw a box of coco pops at the SO’s head. I then jumped on to the bed to jump out of the room and the officers then decked me to the floor.

I was then restrained by all the officers. I was telling the officers to restrain me so that they could actually hurt me. I couldn’t eat for a couple of days after this I was given by staff some chocolate cake with a fork in it. It seems that the staff had forgotten to make sure that I didn’t get things to hurt myself with. During the day I wear normal clothes and at night I have to wear a self-harmers gown. I hid the fork in my gown so that I could self harm with it later.

The staff then tried to get the fork off me and I was restrained. I was then put to the floor by about five staff. I struggled with the staff and was telling them to break my arms. When I get into this low mood I hate everyone and feel like the staff don’t understand anything about me or my condition or how I feel or what the voices are saying in my head.”

We are contending that her treatment is unlawful and inhumane. It is contrary to prison rules to punish someone for incidents of self-injury. And it is clear that staff are totally unable to cope with her.Our lawyers have managed to arrange a psychiatric assessment for her next week and we hope to get her transferred to a hospital whereshe can get proper treatment and care.

Meanwhile, her story is yet another reason why it is just plain cruel (and counter-productive) tohold young girls and boys in prisons. The sooner the Minister agrees to our request to sort out the inquiryinto the treatment of SP the better. We hope that public inquiry will shine a light on the daily misery inflicted on these young people.