A Prison Diary Read online

  William xx James xx

  Thank God for a family I adore, and who still seem to care about me. I’m not sure how I would have got through the last few weeks without them. They made so many sacrifices to be with me for every day of the seven-week trial.

  There is a rap on the cell door, and a steel grille that resembles a large letter box is pulled up to reveal the grinning West Indian.

  ‘I’m Lester,’ he declares as he pushes through a pillow – rock hard; one pillow case – mauve; followed by one sheet – green; and one blanket – brown. I thank Lester and then take some considerable time making the bed. After all, there’s nothing else to do.

  When I’ve completed the task, I sit on the bed and start trying to read The Moon’s a Balloon, but my mind continually wanders. I manage about fifty pages, often stopping to consider the jury’s verdict, and although I feel tired, even exhausted, I can’t begin to think about sleep. The promised phone call has not materialized, so I finally turn off the fluorescent light that shines above the bed, place my head on the rock-hard pillow and despite the agonizing cries of the patients from the cells on either side of me, I eventually fall asleep. An hour later I’m woken again when the fluorescent light is switched back on, the letter box reopens and two different eyes peer in at me – a procedure that is repeated every hour, on the hour – to make sure I haven’t tried to take my own life. The suicide watch.

  I eventually fall asleep again, and when I wake just after 4 am, I lie on my back in a straight line, because both my ears are aching after hours on the rock-hard pillow. I think about the verdict, and the fact that it had never crossed my mind even for a moment that the jury could find Francis innocent and me guilty of the same charge. How could we have conspired if one of us didn’t realize a conspiracy was taking place? They also appeared to accept the word of my former secretary, Angie Peppiatt, a woman who stole thousands of pounds from me, while deceiving me and my family for years.

  Eventually I turn my mind to the future. Determined not to waste an hour, I decide to write a daily diary of everything I experience while incarcerated.

  At 6 am, I rise from my mean bed and rummage around in my plastic bag. Yes, what I need is there, and this time the authorities have not determined that it should be returned to sender. Thank God for a son who had the foresight to include, amongst other necessities, an A4 pad and six felt-tip pens.

  Two hours later I have completed the first draft of everything that has happened to me since I was sent to jail.

  Day 2

  Friday 20 July 2001

  8.00 am

  I am woken officially – my little trapdoor is opened and I am greeted by the same warm West Indian grin, which turns to a look of surprise when he sees me sitting at the table writing. I’ve already been at work for nearly two hours.

  ‘You’ll be able to have a shower in a few minutes,’ he announces. I’ve already worked out that in prison a few minutes can be anything up to an hour, so I go on writing. ‘Anything you need?’ he asks politely.

  ‘Would it be possible to have some more writing paper?’

  ‘Not something I’m often asked for,’ he admits, ‘but I’ll see what I can do.’

  Lester returns half an hour later and this time the grin has turned into a shy smile. He slips an A4 pad, not unlike the type I always use, through the little steel trap. In return he asks me for six autographs, only one to be personalized – for his daughter Michelle. Lester doesn’t offer any explanation for why he needs the other five, all to be penned on separate sheets of paper. As no money can change hands in jail, we return to thirteenth-century England and rely on bartering.

  I can’t imagine what five Jeffrey Archer signatures are worth: a packet of cigarettes, perhaps? But I am grateful for this trade, because I have a feeling that being allowed to write in this hellhole may turn out to be the one salvation that will keep me sane.

  While I wait for Lester to return and escort me from my cell to a shower – even a walk down a long, drab corridor is something I am looking forward to – I continue writing. At last I hear a key turning and look up to see the heavy door swing open, which brings its own small sense of freedom Lester hands me a thin green towel, a prison toothbrush and a tube of prison toothpaste before locking me back in. I clean my teeth, and my gums bleed for the first time in years. It must be some physical reaction to what I’ve been put through during the past twenty-four hours. I worry a little, because during my interrupted night I’d promised myself that I must remain physically and mentally fit. This, according to the prison handbook left in every cell, is nothing less than the management requires.*

  After a night on the medical wing, one of my first impressions is how many of the staff, dressed in their smart, clean black uniforms, seem able to keep a smile on their face. I’m sitting on my bed wondering what to expect next, when my thoughts are interrupted by someone shouting from the other side of the block.

  ‘Mornin’, Jeff, bet you didn’t expect to find yourself in ‘ere.’

  I look through my tiny window and across the yard to see a face staring at me from behind his own bars. Another grin. ‘I’m Gordon,’ he shouts. ‘See you in the exercise yard in about an hour.’

  9.00 am

  I’m let out of the cell and walk slowly down the corridor, to enjoy my new-found freedom, as Lester escorts me to the shower room. I feel I should let you know that in my apartment on the Albert Embankment, perhaps the facility of which I am most proud is the shower room. When I step out of it each morning, I feel a new man, ready to face the world. Belmarsh doesn’t offer quite the same facilities or leave you with the same warm feeling. The large stone-floored room has three small press-button showers that issue a trickle of water which is at best lukewarm. The pressure lasts for about thirty seconds before you have to push the button again. This means a shower takes twice as long as usual but, as I am becoming aware, in prison time is the one commodity that is in abundance. Lester escorts me back to my cell, while I cling on to my small soaking towel. He tells me not to lose sight of it, because a towel has to last for seven days.

  He slams the door closed.

  10.00 am

  I lie on my bed, staring up at the white ceiling, until my thoughts are once again interrupted by a key turning in the lock. I have no idea who it will be this time. It turns out to be a plump lady dressed in a prison uniform who has something in common with the West Indian barterer – a warm smile. She sits down on the end of my bed and hands me a form for the prison canteen. She explains that, if I can afford it, I am allowed to spend twelve pounds fifty pence a week. I must fill in the little boxes showing what I would like, and then she will see that the order is left in my cell sometime later today. I don’t bother to enquire what ‘sometime later’ means. When she leaves, I study the canteen list meticulously, trying to identify what might be described as necessities.

  I am horrified to discover that the first column on the list is dominated by several different types of tobacco, and the second column by batteries – think about it. I study the form for some considerable time, and even enjoy deciding how I will spend my twelve pounds fifty.

  11.00 am

  A bell rings, as if announcing the end of class. The cell door is opened to allow me to join the other inmates and spend forty-five minutes in the exercise yard. I’m sure you’ve seen this activity portrayed in many films – it’s not quite the same experience when you have to participate yourself. Before going down to the yard, we all have to undergo another body search, not unlike one you might go through at an airport. We are then led down three flights of iron steps to an exercise yard at ground level.

  I pace around the furlong square that is enclosed by a high red-brick wall, with a closely mown threadbare lawn in the centre. After a couple of rounds, I’m joined by Gordon, the voice who greeted me this morning from the window on the other side of the block. He turns out to be tall and slim, with the build of an athlete. He tells me without any prompting that he has already
served eleven years of a fourteen-year sentence for murder. This is the fifth prison they’ve sent him to. Can’t be for good behaviour, is my first reaction.* The author in me is curious to find out more about him, but I don’t have to ask any questions because he never stops talking, which I later discover is a common trait among lifers.

  Gordon is due out in three years’ time and, although dyslexic, has taken an Open University degree in English and is now studying for a law degree. He also claims to have written a book of poetry, which I seem to recall reading something about in the Daily Mail.

  ‘Don’t talk to me about the press,’ he screeches like a tape recorder you can’t switch off. ‘They always get it wrong. They said I shot my lover’s boyfriend when I found them in bed together, and that he was an Old Etonian.’

  ‘And he wasn’t an Old Etonian?’ I probe innocently.

  ‘Yeah, course he was,’ said Gordon. ‘But I didn’t shoot him, did I? I stabbed him seventeen times.’

  I feel sick at this matter-of-fact revelation, delivered with neither remorse nor irony. Gordon goes on to tell me that he was twenty at the time, and had run away from home at the age of fourteen, after being sexually abused. I shuddered, despite the sun beaming down on me. I wonder just how long it will be before I’m not sickened by such confessions. How long before I don’t shudder? How long before it becomes matter-of-fact, commonplace?

  As we continue our circumnavigation of the yard, he points out Ronnie Biggs, who’s sitting on a bench in the far corner surrounded by geraniums.

  ‘They’ve just planted those, Jeff,’ says Gordon. ‘They must have known you were comin’.’ Again, he doesn’t laugh. I glance across to see a sick old man with a tube coming out of his nose. A man who doesn’t look as if he has long to live.

  Another circuit, before I ask Gordon about a young West Indian who has his face turned to the wall, and hasn’t moved an inch since I walked into the yard.

  ‘He killed his wife and young daughter,’ says Gordon. ‘He’s tried to commit suicide three times since they locked him up, and doesn’t talk to no one.’

  I felt strangely compassionate for this double murderer as we pass him for a third time. As we overtake another man who looks totally lost, Gordon whispers, ‘That’s Barry George, who’s just been done for killing Jill Dando.’ I didn’t tell him that Jill was an old friend and we both hail from Weston-super-Mare. For the first time in my life, I keep my counsel. ‘No one in here believes he did it,’ says Gordon, ‘including the screws.’ I still make no comment. However, George’s and my trial ran concurrently at the Old Bailey, and I was surprised by how many senior lawyers and laymen told me they were disturbed by the verdict. ‘I’ll bet he gets off on appeal,’* Gordon adds as another bell rings to indicate that our forty-five minutes of ‘freedom’ is up.

  Once again we are all searched before leaving the yard, which puzzles me; if we didn’t have anything on us when we came in, how could we have acquired anything while we were walking around the yard? I feel sure there is a simple explanation. I ask Gordon.

  ‘They’ve got to go through the whole procedure every time,’ Gordon explains as we climb back up the steps. ‘It’s the regulations.’

  When we reach the third floor, we go our separate ways.

  ‘Goodbye,’ says Gordon, and we never meet again.

  I read three days later in the Sun that Ronald Biggs and I shook hands after Gordon had introduced us.

  11.45 am

  Locked back up in my cell, I continue to write, only to hear the key turning before I’ve completed a full page. It’s Ms Roberts, the Deputy Governor. I stand and offer her my little steel chair. She smiles, waves a hand, and perches herself on the end of the bed. She confirms that the arrangements for my visit to the parish church in Grantchester to attend my mother’s funeral have been sanctioned by the Governor. They have checked the police computer at Scotland Yard, and as I have no previous convictions, and no history of violence, I am automatically a Category D prisoner,* which she explains is important because it means that during the funeral service the prison officers accompanying me need not wear a uniform, and therefore I will not have to be handcuffed.

  The press will be disappointed, I tell her.

  ‘It won’t stop them claiming you were,’ she replies.

  Ms Roberts goes on to tell me that I will be moved from the medical wing to Block Three sometime after lunch. There is no point in asking her when exactly.

  I spend the rest of the morning locked up in my cell, writing, sticking to a routine I have followed for the past twenty-five years – two hours on, two hours off – though never before in such surroundings. When I normally leave home for a writing session I go in search of somewhere that has a view of the ocean.

  12 noon

  I’m let out of my cell to join a queue for lunch. One look at what’s on offer and I can’t face it – overcooked meat, Heaven knows from which animal, mushy peas swimming in water, and potatoes that Oliver Twist would have rejected. I settle for a slice of bread and a tin cup of milk, not a cup of tinned milk. I sit at a nearby table, finish lunch in three minutes, and return to my cell.

  I don’t have to wait long before another woman officer appears to tell me that I’m being transferred to Cell Block Three, better known by the inmates as Beirut. I pack my plastic bag which takes another three minutes while she explains that Beirut is on the other side of the prison.

  ‘Anything must be better than the medical wing,’ I venture.

  ‘Yes, I suppose it is a little better,’ she says. She hesitates. ‘But not that much better.’

  She escorts me along several linking corridors, unlocking and locking even more barred gates, before we arrive in Beirut. My appearance is greeted by cheers from several inmates. I learn later that bets had been placed on which block I would end up in.

  Each of the four blocks serves a different purpose, so it shouldn’t have been difficult to work out that I would end up on Three – the induction block. You remain in ‘induction’ until they have assessed you, like a plane circling above an airport waiting to be told which runway you can finally land on. More of that later.

  My new cell turns out to be slightly larger, by inches, and a little more humane, but, as the officer promised, only just. The walls are an easier-to-live-with shade of green, and this time the lavatory has a flush. No need to pee in the washbasin any more. The view remains consistent. You just stare at another red-brick block, which also shields all human life from the sun. The long walk from the medical block across the prison to Block Three had itself served as a pleasant interlude, but I feel sick at the thought of this becoming a way of life.

  A tea-boy or Listener* called James is waiting outside my cell to greet me. He has a kind face, and reminds me of a prefect welcoming a new boy on his first day at school, the only difference being that he’s twenty years younger than I am. James tells me that if I need any questions answered I should not hesitate to ask. He advises me not to say anything to anyone – prisoners or officers – about my sentence or appeal, or to discuss any subject I don’t want to see in a national newspaper the following day. He warns me that the other prisoners all believe they’re going to make a fortune by phoning the Sun to let a journalist know what I had for lunch. I thank him for the advice my QC has already proffered. James passes over another rock-hard pillow with a green pillowcase, but this time I’m given two sheets and two blankets. He also hands me a plastic plate, a plastic bowl, a plastic mug and a plastic knife and fork. He then tells me the bad news, England were all out for 187. I frown.

  ‘But Australia are 27 for two,’ he adds with a grin. He’s obviously heard about my love of cricket. ‘Would you like a radio?’ he asks. ‘Then you can follow the ball-by-ball commentary.’

  I cannot hide my delight at the thought, and he leaves me while I make up my new bed. He returns a few minutes later with a battered black radio, from I know not where.

  ‘I’ll see you later,’ he says and dis
appears again.

  I take a considerable time balancing the radio on the tiny brick window sill with the aerial poking out between the bars before I am able to tune into the familiar voice of Christopher Martin-Jenkins on Test Match Special. He’s telling Blowers that he needs a haircut. This is followed by the more serious news that Australia are now 92 for 2, and both the Waugh brothers look set in their ways. As it’s an off-writing period, I lie down on the bed and listen to Graham Gooch’s groan as two catches are dropped in quick succession. By the time a bell goes for supper, Australia are 207 for 4, and I suspect are on the way to another innings victory.

  4.00 pm

  Once again I reject the prison food, and wonder how long it will be before I have to give in.

  I return to my cell to find my purchases from the canteen list have been left on the end of my bed. Someone has entered my cell and left without my knowing, is strangely my first reaction. I pour a cup of Buxton water into my plastic mug, and remove the lid from a tube of Pringles. I eat and drink very slowly.

  7.00 pm

  Three hours later another bell rings. All the cell doors are opened by prison officers and the inmates congregate on the ground floor for what is known as ‘Association’. This is the period when you mix with the other prisoners for one hour. As I walk the longest route I can circumnavigate – walking is now a luxury – I discover what activities are on offer. Four black men wearing gold chains with crosses attached are sitting in one corner playing dominoes. I discover later that all four of them are in for murder. None of them appears particularly violent as they consider their next move. I walk on to see two more inmates playing pool, while others lounge around reading the Sun – by far the most popular paper in the prison if one is to judge on a simple head count. At the far end of the room is a long queue for the two phones. Each waiting caller has a £2 phonecard which they can use at any time during Association. I’m told I will receive one tomorrow. Everything is tomorrow. I wonder if in a Spanish jail everything is the day after tomorrow?