Killers Behind Bars. Kate Kray
training, assessment and, finally, preparation for release.
Prisoners are often moved from prison to prison. The authorities don’t like them to get too settled and it is thought that too long in one prison can be detrimental for the lifer. Everyone needs stimulation and challenge and changing prisons at regular intervals can, they believe, help to provide this.
Stage One
Once they have been given a life sentence, all prisoners are allocated to what is known as a main centre prison. For men, that’s currently Wormwood Scrubs in London, Gartree in Leicester, or Wakefield.
The small number of women lifers are usually sent to Durham H Wing, which is a small, secure unit that holds up to 40 women at a time. The unit is inside Durham men’s prison. Or they are taken to Bullwood Hall in Essex.
The ever-increasing number of youngsters (under the age of 21) serving a life sentence are sent to Aylesbury, Swinfen Hall and Castington. These main centres are lifer-only units and are meant to give the lifer a chance to settle down and come to terms with their offence and their sentence. It also gives the screws a chance to carry out an initial assessment and to decide if the prisoner is a risk to himself, other inmates or to staff.
After sentencing, you receive your tariff date. This is the length of time you must serve in order to meet what is called ‘the punishment and deterrence’ set by law. In all cases you must complete your tariff date before you’re let out. However, your case will be looked at by the Local Review Committee before that, usually three years before your tariff date.
Tariff dates vary. My brother-in-law Reggie Kray, for example, didn’t have a tariff date because he received a recommended sentence. The same is true of Harry Roberts. He has to serve a recommended 30 years, so the tariff system will not apply until he has completed his recommended sentence.
Stage Two
This is usually the longest part of the sentence and is mostly served in more than one prison. If you’re considered a high-risk prisoner, then you are sent to a dispersal prison. These are the more secure prisons.
If not a high-risk prisoner, you are sent to a Category B training prison. These prisons have a more relaxed regime but still within a secure perimeter. Cat. B prisons are not only for lifers. Other inmates will be serving much shorter sentences. These men will all have a release date and may be allowed parole and home leave. This can cause problems for the lifers. They often strike up a close friendship with these other inmates, so they find their departure hard to take. That, in turn, can cause frustration and resentment – and sometimes trouble.
Stage Three
After many years in a Cat. B prison, the move to a Category C is normally the most difficult. For a long time the lifer has probably been looking forward to the day when he will eventually be moved to a Cat. C, because, as he sees it, he’s finally on his way out. It is a big step forward.
Cat. Cs are much less secure and have a lower level of supervision, although still within a secure perimeter. However, the lifer can face new problems. The inmate population will be a lot younger than most lifers at this stage in their sentence and they tend to be serving much shorter sentences. In a Cat. C prison, the lifer is expected to adjust to the pressures and stresses of life on the outside. He also loses all the privileges that he has become accustomed to in other prisons, while release is still an uncertainty. He sees other Cat. C prisoners enjoying home leave and looking forward to their release date but the wait for the lifer is endless. He still has to undergo many reviews and reports before there is even the prospect of a move to a Cat. D.
Stage Four: Category D, release phase and PRES hostel.
Under no circumstances can a lifer proceed to a Cat. D without the approval of the Minister of State for Prisons, and that’s only given after a recommendation from the Parole Board.
After settling in to a Cat. D prison, the lifer may be taken on supervised days out. These become more and more frequent, until the lifer has built up confidence and trust. Then, and only then, is he allowed unsupervised days out and allowed to work outside the prison.
Security at Cat. Ds is kept to a minimum and, essentially, the lifer is his own gaoler. After a specified number of days out without any problems, and when all the reports have been satisfactory, the Parole Board and the Home Secretary eventually agree that the lifer can be given a provisional release date.
This is usually preceded by a period of six to nine months at a Pre-Release Employment Scheme hostel (PRES). While he’s at the hostel, the lifer is expected to find a job and will have to save the best part of his wage to show that he can cope on the outside. Once he has complied with all the rules, and only with approval, he will be allowed weekend home leave.
Stage Five: life licence.
After many years in prison, and only after long consideration by the Parole Board, a lifer may eventually be allowed out of prison for good. This will be on licence and under the strict supervision of the Probation Office. However, the final decision to release a lifer does not come from the Parole Board; they can only submit a recommendation for release. The final word comes from the Home Secretary.
If, and when, you’re finally let out on licence, you are still not free in one sense. You have to report to a probation officer once, maybe twice, a week in the beginning. You also have to ask their permission to do anything like move house or change your job. You can’t go abroad on holiday or have any association with known criminals.
If you are lucky enough to find a job, your probation officer may insist that you inform your employer that you’re ‘out on licence’. In some cases, if the crime you committed was a particularly violent one, you may have to tell the employer the nature of the crime: then it’s up to him if he still wants to employ you. If, as a lifer, you start to become personally or romantically involved with someone, your probation officer will want to meet the person and, if you haven’t already told them that you are ‘out on licence’, the probation officer will.
A detailed report on your progress is sent to the Home Office every three months. If your probation officer or the Home Office is not happy with your progress, you can be recalled to prison at any time.
For this book, I interviewed ten lifers. All of their stories are different. Some are sad; some are just downright brutal. I didn’t write this book to justify or condone in any way what they did nor to say that they shouldn’t be punished for their horrific crimes. On the contrary, I don’t think murder should go unpunished. What interested me was the truth – as they saw it – of what happened – not the newspaper stories or the gossip but the real story behind the story. I don’t think it’s my job to judge them – they’ve been judged already. All I am trying to do here is tell you their stories as they told them to me.
It was my brother-in-law Reggie Kray who first introduced me to Harry Roberts in Gartree Prison in 1988. When he was interviewed for this book Harry had been in prison for 28 years for killing three policemen but, in all, he spent 33 years and seven months of his 58-year life in some of the toughest prisons in Britain, although to see and speak to him, you wouldn’t think it.
Harry is a very intelligent, astute man who keeps himself up to date with the outside world in every aspect. After serving so much time in prison, though, there isn’t anything he doesn’t know about the system. He says: ‘Don’t matter how much you “hoot and holler”, you will never beat the system.’
If anybody should know, Harry Roberts should – he’s an expert. Harry first went to prison in 1954, before I was even born, when prisons were tough. He told me that back in the 1950s prisoners weren’t allowed to talk, and a deathly silence hung over the cold, wrought-iron landings. In those days the food was slop; you were only allowed one egg a year, at Easter, and your one treat was Christmas Day when there was fish and chips for dinner.
‘They didn’t muck about with ya in those days,’ he told me. ‘They would birch ya or give ya the cat-o’-nine-tails or, if ya murdered someone,