Legal Advice for Women Prisoners

Update Report

Women Prisoners

Since our last report, we have continued delivering our longer-established outreach clinics for women prisoners at HMP Send and HMP Holloway, and our newer clinics at HMP Bronzefield, HMP Eastwood Park, HMP New Hall and HMP Styal. Over the last few months, we conducted 16 clinics, which a total of 105 women prisoners attended.

PAS article in Women in Prison magazine

One of our Caseworkers wrote an article called “Acquiring a Roof over Your Head!” which was published in the Spring 2016 edition of “Ready Steady Go!” magazine That is the publication produced by the charity Women In Prison. This article explains how PAS can assist women prisoners to obtain supported accommodation on release, particularly women who have physical or mental disabilities or a debilitating illness.

Case Study: Representing a Woman Prisoner with Mental Health Difficulties at a Parole Board hearing:

We represented a woman serving a life sentence, who had been in prison for 12 years beyond her tariff (minimum custodial period) and who was applying to the Parole Board to be transferred to an open prison. She had a history of suffering from severe anxiety prior to Parole Board hearings but had worked very hard at addressing her mental health difficulties over the last two years. By attending one-to-one psychology appointments on a regular basis, she had become better able to manage her stress levels. Due to the relationship we had established with her, we were also able to provide her with support and reassurance throughout the process, particularly leading up to the hearing. We represented her at the hearing and assisted her to satisfy the panel that she could be safely managed in an open setting. As a result, she has now been transferred to an open prison.

Disabled Prisoners

During this reporting period, your donations have supported our Community Care Caseworker to deliver several advice clinics within 4 prisons: HMP Pentonville, HMP Thameside, HMP Wandsworth (all in London), and HMP Leyhill (in Gloucestershire), giving advice to prisoners in person. You have also supported our Caseworker to deal with hundreds of telephone and letter enquiries, and to work on a number of ongoing cases advising disabled prisoners.

Case Study: Ensuring improved facilities for a disabled prisoner:

A disabled prisoner had been transferred to a prison that did not have modified cells, in-cell sinks, or single showers available. The prisoner is doubly incontinent. At his previous prisons, where the facilities were better, he had been able to clean himself up in his cell and officers would unlock him to go to take a shower. In his new prison, all the showers were communal, and officers would not unlock him to allow him out of his cell to wash. He remained at this prison, enduring these conditions, for one month until he contacted us. We made representations to the Governor and Head of Healthcare at the prison that such conditions risked breaching Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights which concerns ‘inhuman and degrading treatment’. After our intervention, the prisoner was promptly transferred to a suitable prison that can meet his disability needs.

Other News:

PAS Panel Discussion – 18^th May

Thanks very much to everyone who came to our annual panel discussion last week. We hope you enjoyed the evening and found the discussion informative. We would also like to thank all the speakers for their excellent contributions and Linklaters for kindly hosting the event.

New Outreach clinics in HMP Styal and HMP Lewes

We recently opened a new legal advice outreach clinic at HMP Styal and it is scheduled to run every six weeks. We are also introducing our peer adviser-led sessions there, in which prisoners trained by us give basic advice and information to their fellow prisoners. We have also started a new clinic in HMP Lewes (in East Sussex) - which is further extending our outreach service in men’s prisons.

PAS participated in seminar organised by Zahid Mubarak Trust

In January 2016 we participated in a seminar at the House of Lords, organised by the Zahid Mubarak Trust (ZMT) and hosted by our patron Lord David Ramsbotham. Zahid Mubarak was murdered by his cellmate in Feltham young offenders’ institute in 2000. Subsequent campaigning by his family resulted in the commissioning of a public inquiry into his death. The Commission for Racial Equality also carried out an inquiry into wider issues of institutional racism in the prison system, which reported in 2003 and found systemic failings. The remit of the seminar on this occasion was to consider what progress, if any, had been made since the 2006 Keith Report of the public inquiry. We have worked with ZMT since it was set up in 2009 and have been involved in a number of initiatives designed to monitor the extent to which prisons have adopted recommendations coming out of the Keith Report. We will continue to do this in the future. However, unfortunately, we had to report to the recent seminar that our current experience is not positive. We reported that our telephone advice line continues to receive a high number of calls from prisoners who have suffered racist treatment and whose complaints have not been properly investigated.

PAS volunteer runs Kingston Half Marathon

One of our dedicated volunteers, Catherine Shannon, ran the Kingston Half Marathon at the end of February (in 1 hour and 52 minutes) to raise funds for our work with prisoners.