used the courts?I spent 8 years in the long term prison system,some of it on rule 43B.GOAD as it's known for short or good order and dicipline.This is a catch all rule used by the screws to segregate when they have no evidence.Mostly a security screw see's a con talking to another and because he can't hear whats said it is suspicious.When ever it was used on me or any of my political friends a specifically worded letter was sent to a solicitor instructing him to go to the high court and force the prison to put up the evidence.I never knew of a case that had to go there as the governor would allways negotiate a deal that satisfied him and got us out of GOAD.I can't see John being on his own.The seg unit allways has a compliment of customers.If they stick together they can get results.I feel sorry for John.Being a lifer they have him.But one of our regular seg mates was John Kamara.He never took shit and got out.Another was Wesley Dick.I think Wesley smashed every telly in every nick he went to.But he did serve the full 18 years of his sentence.But it is better than to bow to the evil bastards.

Dear Con

See article below re John using the courts. I'm sure he will again if needs be although it's not easy in the current situation as they are likely to say that as the Parole Board is reviewing his imprisonment, that is access to legal process and no judicial review allowed. Also some time in the 1990s the courts decided that they wouldn't deal with challenges to segregation decisions as governors should have the discretion to decide such matters without pesky lawyers interfering.

For the record, Rule 43b is now Rule 45 and GOAD called GOOD. A segregation unit is now officialy called a Security, Care and Control Unit - yes honestly!!!!

If you ever see Wesley (aka Shujaa) big him up from us!!!





Hands off John Bowden! Published in Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! 197 July/July 2007

On 18 April 2007, after nine months in an open prison and shortly before a parole hearing to decide his suitability for release after 25 years in prison, John Bowden was placed in solitary confinement. The next day he was moved to a closed prison. .

On the day of John’s transfer the Dundee Courier’s front-page headline proclaimed 'Castle Huntly killer has terror links'. The article begins: ‘A 'Castle Huntly prison social worker fears a brutal killer, due for parole in two weeks, has links to terrorists. A report by the social worker claims that low-security inmate John “Ginger” Bowden is in continual contact with “eco-terrorists or paramilitary members” and has received visits from “people involved in terrorism”.’

The ‘social worker’ in question is Matt Stillman, who John describes as ‘a right-wing American entrenched in punitive ideas about the role of the parole and probation system’, and who appears to have been chosen specifically for this reason for the task of writing a vital report for consideration by the Parole Board panel that will determine if John is to be released.
The alleged ‘terrorists’ are in fact Brighton Anarchist Black Cross (ABC). ABC is a longstanding organisation, with small but active groups in many countries, dedicated to supporting ‘class struggle prisoners’. FRFI has worked with ABC groups for many years, united by our shared understanding of the importance of the struggle within prison. ABC’s main activities are writing to prisoners, organising benefits to raise funds for prisoners’ welfare and supporting or organising solidarity pickets of prisons. To label Brighton ABC as ‘terrorist’ is ridiculous and easily refutable; however this attack on John Bowden and ABC is intended to send a message to prisoners in British gaols that they stand up for themselves and others at their peril, and to prison support activists to back off or risk being blamed for decisions not to release. Neither John nor ABC are bowing to this pressure and are fighting the attack politically. All FRFI readers in and out of prison are encouraged to support their campaign.

John Bowden was imprisoned for murder in 1980, and has been in contact with FRFI since 1983. In 1984, following a trial resulting from a protest at Parkhurst the previous year, he wrote: ‘I was banished from open society for a serious infringement of criminal law – yet here I am deprived of any legal or civil protection from the murderous intentions and actions of a barbaric and antiquated penal system…I shall continue the struggle in every way possible to tear down that cloak of state secrecy and reveal the gross inhumanity that it seeks to hide.’

John has been good to his pledge, taking every opportunity that has presented itself to organise, educate and empower prisoners, to encourage political activists outside prison to be interested in and understand the use of prison as a weapon of oppression against the working class, to write for radical publications and to correspond with political and politicised prisoners around the world.

During this time the prison system itself has undergone many changes. John has always been quick to seize the opportunities presented by ‘liberal’ moments but has never been taken in by the promises of reform. In 1989-91 John worked within Long Lartin maximum security prison to organise a series of forums at which outside speakers, prisoners and prison staff would openly debate aspects of imprisonment. The prison responded well initially, allowing John and others to invite in guests who would never ordinarily have been permitted, including representatives of FRFI, but, just as the first and biggest forum was about to take place and the prison was basking in the reflected glory, the ‘liberal’ governor had John ghosted to Winson Green prison, where he was viciously assaulted by screws. The forum went ahead without him and John later successfully sued the Prison Service for the attack.

After the 1990 Strangeways uprising, John wrote a manifesto for prisoners’ rights, which he and other Long Lartin prisoners submitted to the Woolf Inquiry into the revolt. He also contributed to Larkin Publications 1995 book on the uprising: Strangeways 1990: a serious disturbance, writing:

‘Within a prison system that had relied so heavily on brutality and an institutionalised denial of basic human rights, the Strangeways uprising represented an eloquent statement that things would never again be quite the same…Prisoners had shown that even one of the most brutal gaols in England, a true bastion of screw power and authority, could be reduced to a burning wreck if and when prisoners said enough was enough. The lesson was certainly not lost on those who manage and administer the prison regime…The liberal façade of Woolf was coupled with a hidden agenda motivated by revenge and a determination to eradicate protest on the scale of Strangeways for ever more...’

Indeed, between 1990 and 2000 the British prison system was completely overhauled and hundreds of new divide-and-rule measures introduced, with the aim of preventing resistance on the scale of Strangeways ever occurring again. This attack has had a significant degree of success and by 2000 when Turkish prisoners were on hunger-strike, and John and Mark Barnsley were attempting to initiate solidarity within the British prison system, the smallest of group actions had become something many prisoners would shy away from for fear of loss of privileges, bad reports and ultimately denial of release.

In this climate John continued to operate politically, organising where possible and talking at length with younger prisoners, encouraging them to read about and understand the alienating and oppressive situation they found themselves in. At the same time, he began to prepare himself for his own possible release. Prior to April he had spent two years working unsupervised in the outside community as a volunteer on projects for the mentally ill and socially vulnerable, and had qualified as a literacy tutor for people with learning difficulties. He had been allowed frequent home leaves. As he wrote recently: ‘The two fundamental criteria determining a life sentence prisoner's suitability for release, the expiry of the recommended period of time served in the interests of retribution, and the absence of any risk to the public, were both sufficiently established in my case. ‘

However, two decades of exposing and confronting the reality of British prisons were not going to be forgiven. John writes: ‘The truth is that my treatment is politically motivated and inspired by a determination to continuously punish me for having fought the system in the past and encouraging others to do so, and also by a determination to render me intellectually and politically compliant and submissive. As far as the prison system is concerned, the imperative now is not about negating any genuine risk that I might pose to the community, that stopped being an issue many years ago, but primarily about eradicating my political identity and spirit. From this point on, therefore, my continuing imprisonment is nakedly political and centres wholly on what I continue to represent to a prison system ever fearful of a politically awakened and militant prisoner movement.’

for years.But if i do i will pass on your regards.I am a bit concerned about Alan Lord as i know they fingered him as a leader in straneways.Any news about him?John needs someone in high places on his side.we managed to convince the Earl of Caithness that not having the use of phones in remand centres broke the judges rules.He wrote back and agreed and said the use of phones was permitted.30 of us were shipped out to Preston the next day.Unfortunetly(for them) Preston had never been a remand prison and they were nieve and when we walked in the office and picked up the phone the screw was flabbergasted.We showed our letter and he ran for the governor who read it and let us.Not long later phones were put on the landings in all jails.It sounds like there is no solidarity any more.Pity it's the only way to keep your rights,and your dignity.Johns dignity will gain him respect in high places,probably already has.Keep resisting.

FRFI 192 August/September 2006
Alan Lord: 16 years after Strangeways the punishment continues


At the beginning of May, I travelled to Kingston prison in Portsmouth to act as an observer at the parole hearing of life-sentence prisoner Alan Lord. It was an interesting experience, which gave me an unexpected insight into the lifer system. I cannot say that I was impressed.

Long-time FRFI readers will know that Alan was present for 23 of the 25 days of the Strangeways uprising in April 1990. After the revolt he received an additional ten-year prison sentence to run concurrently with the life sentence he was already serving.

Alan was 20 years old when he was given life for the murder of a jeweller in Manchester in 1981. The trial judge recommended he should serve 15 years. Now, 26 years on, Alan is still a category B prisoner, having been finally downgraded from the highest security category, Category A, in 2003.

After Strangeways Alan was shunted around the system like a parcel and suffered at the hands of staff who were not prepared to forgive him for his part in what was the biggest disturbance in British penal history. However, for at least the last ten years, he has been a ‘model prisoner’ and receives good reports from those in daily contact with him.

Despite this general good behaviour, Alan is still seen as something of an awkward customer by the prison authorities. He is not slow to complain but always does so through the official channels. Over the years, he has acquired habits and traits that are seen by his keepers as non-conformist. For example, he does not sleep on a bed - a legacy from the days when he was moved (and abused) on a regular basis. He takes the view that, the less he ‘takes’ from those in power, the less they are able to take from him. Using the same reasoning, Alan has never had a television in his cell. He keeps his possessions neatly packed at all times, ready for any sudden move.

A fair-minded system might view such traits as idiosyncrasies, understandable pockets of behaviour after a quarter of a century of incarceration. Observing the parole hearing, it became clear that the system did not share that outlook.

A district judge chaired the hearing, and a governor was there to present the views of the Secretary of State. Alan was represented by a barrister and there were several staff witnesses from Dovegate, his previous prison, and Kingston.

The board heard that Alan was employed at Kingston, that he was on enhanced status and was a ‘polite prisoner, who did not present any concerns. Then a lifer governor from Dovegate said that Alan had impressed there as well, but issues had arisen as a result of a relationship between him and a female custody officer. It was agreed by all concerned that this relationship had been entirely mutual; however as soon as it came to light the work Alan was doing with a psychologist was immediately terminated and it became apparent that his days at that prison were numbered.

Astonishingly, both the governor and the psychologist spent an inordinate length of time discussing whether Alan was ‘institutionalised’ or ‘too rigid in his thinking’. They were concerned that, if Alan was downgraded to Category C or D he might have difficulty in sharing a cell after being so long on his own, as if sharing a tiny space in a prison with another man somehow proved a lesser degree of ‘institutionalisation’. It was even put to him that by not watching television he was lessening his chances of living comfortably in the ‘real world’ – as if television represented reality

The only words of sense in this grotesque debate came from Alan, who, when asked how he would get his views on outside life (if he were free and still not watching the box), replied ‘I would open my front door and look out at life’.

This nonsensical argument aside, the biggest shock of the hearing came by way of omission. Throughout the almost three-hour hearing, the words ‘Strangeways’ and ‘riot’ were not uttered once. But for the seriousness of the situation, it would have compared with the Fawlty Towers farce-line, ‘Don’t mention the war!’ But this is no laughing matter. This is a matter of an unforgiving system, still bent on revenge, 16 years after it was exposed as rotten and brutal to the core.

Alan Lord is still in prison because of his part in the Strangeways uprising, yet the system that keeps him incarcerated dare not say as much. If it did, then his supporters could point to masses of evidence, including Lord Justice Woolf’s official inquiry report into the disturbance to show that he and his fellow protesters were scapegoats for the failures of the Prison Service.

‘The disturbance was planned as a limited protest, the majority of inmates shared the belief that conditions at the jail were unacceptable and inhumane...there are three requirements which must be met if the prison system is to be stable: they are security, control and justice...The April 1990 disturbances were a consequence of the failure of the prison system to conform to these basic rules.’ (Woolf Report 1991)

So, officially, Alan Lord remains in prison due to fears that he is institutionalised! His good behaviour seemingly counts for little. The process is a sham and an affront to the justice that Woolf spoke about.

In his own words to the parole hearing: ‘I behave, I do all the programmes, but the gate doesn’t get any nearer.’

A few days after the hearing Alan received his answer. His application for a move to an open prison, where lifers have to spend a period prior to release, was denied. The gate is still a long way away.
Eric Allison

You can write to Alan Lord (K80382) at HMP Kingston, 122 Milton Road, Portsmouth, Hants, PO3 6AS.

That sounds like the Alan i know.I'd love to drop him a line but i think it would do more harm than good.As soon as my name came back into association with him.We were all involved in a prior incident befor strangways that would raise spectres for him.If you see him tell him J the booky was askin

With respect to the comments on Alan Lord the main point to remember is that he murdered an innocent man, a man, with a wife and three young children, who was doing nothing other than walking harmlessly home after an honest day's work. Lord drove a four inch knife into this man's back and then into his chest, killing him instantly. He then stole the few watches the murdered man had in his briefcase (his job was to fix watches in a jewellers) and some precision tools. He could have robbed this slight and inoffensive man by merely threatening him or if he had to by striking him. To use such a level of violence for such a small gain on a defenceless stranger is a matter more pressing than Lord's role in the Strangeways' Riot.

Lord is a living example of why we should re-open the debate on capital punishment. No man has a right to murder others in such a way. When he killed that man he forfeited the right to live in a civilised society ruled by law. In most countries in the world the appropriate sentence should have been hanging or life in prison to mean life, insofar that he must die in prison. He's lucky that he lives in 'soft justice' Britain. What he did in the Strangeways' Riot is secondary to his main crime. In that riot he beat a man within an inch of death and then tossed him onto the safety nets draping each wing. The man died from a blood clot caused by the beating but Lord got away on a technicality.

What kind of world does Lord want to live in? If he was such a hard man and wanted violence he could have found all the violence in the world within certain stratas of this society, if he was man enough. But instead he murdered two weak men, inoffensive and unable to defend themselves as they had no weapon and were not accustomed to physical violence. We have tight gun laws here so innocent people cannot carry a gun to defend themselves with. The only thing they have to defend themselves again people like Lord is the law. And the law mostly lets the victims of crime down.