6/5/2008Barlinnie - Rules and Regulations
THE regulations couldn't be more explicit for the hundreds of women and children who visit their menfolk in Barlinnie each week.
All they can take in are 10 £1 coins for use in the cafeteria.
Any personal belongings are deposited in lockers. Anything they wish to give to a prisoner is taken, X-rayed and forwarded to him in his hall.
So far, so normal. But many visitors are intent on smuggling in something else altogether, hard drugs.
"In the visits of late, we've been getting a heck of a lot of drugs in," says operations manager Arshaq Ahmad.
"It's a wee bit of cannabis, a wee bit of cocaine, but it's mainly heroin.
"Cocaine, after all, is a party drug, it makes you high. Do you really want to be high in a tiny prison cell, where it's really difficult to party? Almost all the smuggled-in heroin is smoked; a tiny fraction of prisoners may inject. Needles have been found from time to time." says Mr Arshaq.
Harm reduction kits have been issued by the Scottish Prison Service, in line with practice in some other European countries.
The rocketing popularity of drugs in the outside world is reflected in Barlinnie. Up to 350 prisoners receive methadone from its health centre, while another 150 or so are on medicated detox.
Female visitors have been known to secrete drugs in or around their person.
Prison officers, however, have limited powers of search, which inhibits them severely.
Drugs are passed to prisoners by kissing, or are concealed in food that is shared around.
Visitors are told not to share individual drinks or bars of chocolate, but many do exactly the opposite.
Mr Ahmad admits that, despite officers' vigilance, only "the tip of the iceberg" is found.
If drugs are discovered, and they are over a certain amount, the police are called in.
A year ago, Jim Dawson, assistant secretary of the Scottish Prison Officers Association, pointed out that some contraband would always make it past prison security.
"As long as there have been prisons, there have been people smuggling stuff into them," he said.
"To stop anything being smuggled in, there would have to be a draconian regime."
Mr Dawson was speaking after figures revealed that, in a 15-month period, Barlinnie officers had made 261 seizures of drugs, needles and other paraphernalia, by far the most of any Scottish jail.
Two years ago, Glasgow lawyer Angela Baillie was jailed for 32 months for smuggling a cigarette packet stuffed with heroin and Valium to a crime boss in Barlinnie.
Visits to the notorious jail last for 40 minutes for convicted prisoners and 30 minutes for those on remand.
An hour-long morning visit is available to convicted inmates, should their partner wish to drop the kids off at school first.
Some visits are 'closed,' with thick glass panels separating prisoner from partner.
They are prescribed when the prisoner has been badly behaved, or when his visitor has been found to be "in contact with drugs," thanks to a sensitive machine, which uses Hoover-type or wand-type attachments to detect traces of drugs on visitors.
"All we say to the visitor is that the machine has given an indication. We're not saying they're using drugs, only that they've been in contact with them, and offer them a closed visit on this one occasion."
Such visits are hugely unpopular to people on either side of the glass.
"They all absolutely hate it because there is no way you can get any physical contact," says Mr Ahmad.
"The number of complaints this generates is unbelievable."
Some desperate visitors even try, cunningly, to slip contraband through the crack between window and wood, but fresh sealant fills the cracks on this visit.
Nearby, for the open visits, there's a larger, friendlier room, with cafeteria and kids' play area. Prisoners' skillful artworks, landscapes, Marilyn Monroe, Jim Morrison, dominate the walls.
With its bright colours, curving benches and 40 circular tables, it could pass for a school or office cafeteria.
The place is open during the week from 9.30am and the last visit is at 7.35pm. At weekends, it's chaotic, with convicted prisoners in the morning and remand prisoners in the afternoon.
The prison's opening hours are reduced at weekends, but with families clamouring to visit their loved ones, the staff are under pressure.
The visits are all run carefully. You won't get prisoners from different halls at the same time here, there's too much of a risk that someone might get slashed. There are separate times, too, for untried prisoners, and for those on protection.
"We average between 8000 and 10,000 visits every month, and that's not including the 800 agents, lawyers, social workers, drug workers, who come in to see prisoners," says visits manager Robert Kinnear, a 12-year veteran of Barlinnie.
"At each table you're allowed one prisoner and three adults and as many children as you want." He indicates the small partition that divides each seat; the prisoner always sits on one side, on his own, with visitors on the other side.
A mere five staff are on duty when the visits take place, but they're backed up by a large number of ceiling cameras.
If the prisoner population reaches the critical point of 1665, an adjacent visiting room would have to be opened up and five more officers would have to be taken from other duties to staff it.
The governor would have no choice; the law entitles prisoners to visits and they would complain if they were denied. You get used to the hustle and bustle," says Mr Kinnear, "and we have a written procedure that helps us manage the visits.
"It runs quite smoothly, but as the place gets busier and busier, it's just a case of putting one lot of prisoners out and the next lot in, right away. It's like a conveyor belt.
"I'm lucky because I've been here for long enough and I can deal with it. But you get some people coming in who have just joined and they wonder what has hit them"
Within 30 minutes, the first visits of the night will be getting under way; the first of dozens of wives and girlfriends, children excited to see their dads for the first time in months ... and, no doubt, the first of the kisses in which more than just saliva is being exchanged.
==============
AMONG Barlinnie's other claims to fame, it is Europe's biggest methadone dispensing clinic, with nurses handing it out from 7.15am until 11pm.
"There is a big demand for methadone," confirms prison officer Paul Ryan, addictions services manager in the health centre.
"There are roughly 330 prisoners at the moment on methadone.
The nurses' work continues treatment that the prisoners were already receiving in the community.
Mr Ryan added: "When people come into prison with an addiction issue, it's almost too late to help them. All we can do is try to offer them as much support as possible, but the support really needs to be in the community, where they're living their daily lives.
"The pressure on the prison is that people expect prisoners to leave here almost cured of their addiction.
"We would love to achieve that, but it is very difficult, given the numbers and the resources."
The centre's many services include clinics on sexual heath and blood-born viruses, run by addiction nurses, as well as smoking cessation classes and two drug-offending behaviour programmes, First Steps and Lifeline.
The centre also provides dental health services, podiatry and optician clinics, while mental health issues are overseen by a multi-disciplinary team.
All they can take in are 10 £1 coins for use in the cafeteria.
Any personal belongings are deposited in lockers. Anything they wish to give to a prisoner is taken, X-rayed and forwarded to him in his hall.
So far, so normal. But many visitors are intent on smuggling in something else altogether, hard drugs.
"In the visits of late, we've been getting a heck of a lot of drugs in," says operations manager Arshaq Ahmad.
"It's a wee bit of cannabis, a wee bit of cocaine, but it's mainly heroin.
"Cocaine, after all, is a party drug, it makes you high. Do you really want to be high in a tiny prison cell, where it's really difficult to party? Almost all the smuggled-in heroin is smoked; a tiny fraction of prisoners may inject. Needles have been found from time to time." says Mr Arshaq.
Harm reduction kits have been issued by the Scottish Prison Service, in line with practice in some other European countries.
The rocketing popularity of drugs in the outside world is reflected in Barlinnie. Up to 350 prisoners receive methadone from its health centre, while another 150 or so are on medicated detox.
Female visitors have been known to secrete drugs in or around their person.
Prison officers, however, have limited powers of search, which inhibits them severely.
Drugs are passed to prisoners by kissing, or are concealed in food that is shared around.
Visitors are told not to share individual drinks or bars of chocolate, but many do exactly the opposite.
Mr Ahmad admits that, despite officers' vigilance, only "the tip of the iceberg" is found.
If drugs are discovered, and they are over a certain amount, the police are called in.
A year ago, Jim Dawson, assistant secretary of the Scottish Prison Officers Association, pointed out that some contraband would always make it past prison security.
"As long as there have been prisons, there have been people smuggling stuff into them," he said.
"To stop anything being smuggled in, there would have to be a draconian regime."
Mr Dawson was speaking after figures revealed that, in a 15-month period, Barlinnie officers had made 261 seizures of drugs, needles and other paraphernalia, by far the most of any Scottish jail.
Two years ago, Glasgow lawyer Angela Baillie was jailed for 32 months for smuggling a cigarette packet stuffed with heroin and Valium to a crime boss in Barlinnie.
Visits to the notorious jail last for 40 minutes for convicted prisoners and 30 minutes for those on remand.
An hour-long morning visit is available to convicted inmates, should their partner wish to drop the kids off at school first.
Some visits are 'closed,' with thick glass panels separating prisoner from partner.
They are prescribed when the prisoner has been badly behaved, or when his visitor has been found to be "in contact with drugs," thanks to a sensitive machine, which uses Hoover-type or wand-type attachments to detect traces of drugs on visitors.
"All we say to the visitor is that the machine has given an indication. We're not saying they're using drugs, only that they've been in contact with them, and offer them a closed visit on this one occasion."
Such visits are hugely unpopular to people on either side of the glass.
"They all absolutely hate it because there is no way you can get any physical contact," says Mr Ahmad.
"The number of complaints this generates is unbelievable."
Some desperate visitors even try, cunningly, to slip contraband through the crack between window and wood, but fresh sealant fills the cracks on this visit.
Nearby, for the open visits, there's a larger, friendlier room, with cafeteria and kids' play area. Prisoners' skillful artworks, landscapes, Marilyn Monroe, Jim Morrison, dominate the walls.
With its bright colours, curving benches and 40 circular tables, it could pass for a school or office cafeteria.
The place is open during the week from 9.30am and the last visit is at 7.35pm. At weekends, it's chaotic, with convicted prisoners in the morning and remand prisoners in the afternoon.
The prison's opening hours are reduced at weekends, but with families clamouring to visit their loved ones, the staff are under pressure.
The visits are all run carefully. You won't get prisoners from different halls at the same time here, there's too much of a risk that someone might get slashed. There are separate times, too, for untried prisoners, and for those on protection.
"We average between 8000 and 10,000 visits every month, and that's not including the 800 agents, lawyers, social workers, drug workers, who come in to see prisoners," says visits manager Robert Kinnear, a 12-year veteran of Barlinnie.
"At each table you're allowed one prisoner and three adults and as many children as you want." He indicates the small partition that divides each seat; the prisoner always sits on one side, on his own, with visitors on the other side.
A mere five staff are on duty when the visits take place, but they're backed up by a large number of ceiling cameras.
If the prisoner population reaches the critical point of 1665, an adjacent visiting room would have to be opened up and five more officers would have to be taken from other duties to staff it.
The governor would have no choice; the law entitles prisoners to visits and they would complain if they were denied. You get used to the hustle and bustle," says Mr Kinnear, "and we have a written procedure that helps us manage the visits.
"It runs quite smoothly, but as the place gets busier and busier, it's just a case of putting one lot of prisoners out and the next lot in, right away. It's like a conveyor belt.
"I'm lucky because I've been here for long enough and I can deal with it. But you get some people coming in who have just joined and they wonder what has hit them"
Within 30 minutes, the first visits of the night will be getting under way; the first of dozens of wives and girlfriends, children excited to see their dads for the first time in months ... and, no doubt, the first of the kisses in which more than just saliva is being exchanged.
==============
AMONG Barlinnie's other claims to fame, it is Europe's biggest methadone dispensing clinic, with nurses handing it out from 7.15am until 11pm.
"There is a big demand for methadone," confirms prison officer Paul Ryan, addictions services manager in the health centre.
"There are roughly 330 prisoners at the moment on methadone.
The nurses' work continues treatment that the prisoners were already receiving in the community.
Mr Ryan added: "When people come into prison with an addiction issue, it's almost too late to help them. All we can do is try to offer them as much support as possible, but the support really needs to be in the community, where they're living their daily lives.
"The pressure on the prison is that people expect prisoners to leave here almost cured of their addiction.
"We would love to achieve that, but it is very difficult, given the numbers and the resources."
The centre's many services include clinics on sexual heath and blood-born viruses, run by addiction nurses, as well as smoking cessation classes and two drug-offending behaviour programmes, First Steps and Lifeline.
The centre also provides dental health services, podiatry and optician clinics, while mental health issues are overseen by a multi-disciplinary team.
