Helping young prisoners choose a different future
How can young offenders be rehabilitated into the community, so that they do not reoffend after they are released? The issue is particularly in the public mind following the jailing of many young people after last summer’s wave of city violence.
Two members of the chaplaincy of Her Majesty's Prison/Young Offenders Institution Rochester spoke about what they see as some of the causes of the rioting, and the work they do with young prisoners, when they addressed a Greencoat Forum in IofC’s London centre on 21 February, 2012.
Shaffiq Din, Coordinator of the chaplaincy and Muslim Chaplain, and Sarah Tranter, Community Links Manager and a Christian, work side by side to mentor the young prisoners and to hold out to them the option of deciding to make a new start when they leave. In the process, Tranter and Din have become close colleagues. Tranter told how she was brought up fearing Islam and prejudiced towards other religions. But through their working relationship, they had both discovered that Christians and Muslims can work very effectively together.
The evening started with a short film showing Din and Tranter in the chaplaincy at Rochester HMP/YOI two years ago, hosting a visit by Imam Muhammad Ashafa and Pastor James Wuye, two former rival gang leaders from Nigeria. The chaplaincy has been using The Imam and the Pastor, a film about their reconciliation, with groups of young offenders.
Asking what it is in our society which gave rise to the rioting, Din contrasted our culture with that of Japan where, after the last year’s earthquake and tsunami, there had been no riots or looting of shops at all. In Japan, people didn’t think that they had the right to take something that didn’t belong to them, Din commented.
Tranter said, ‘We see lack of respect for authority with teachers disempowered, families breaking down and in general moral standards going down. Our culture promotes instant gratification, and that in the end creates financial and moral poverty.’
‘Our system tells you that you have to be rich to be successful,’ said Din. ‘But it doesn’t provide the opportunities to realise that.’ He cited comparative studies of other countries that suggest a correlation between the gap between the richest and poorest, and the incidence of crime and the size of the prison population. ‘Of course most crime happens in the poorest areas!’ Britain has some 85,000 offenders in prison - one of the highest ratios to population in the world. And it costs the state around £38,000 a year to keep one person in prison – ‘More than being educated at Eton!’ he said.
Din said that even eight years ago when he started as a prison chaplain, there had been a higher proportion of young offenders who could be ‘turned round’. Now, many of those who come to Rochester YOI are ‘beyond reach’ without hugely increased resources. He gave an example of a boy who had grown up in a dysfunctional family. His mother abused him when he was a child. When his parents divorced, he stayed with his father who also abused him. He was given to a foster family who, unbelievably, also abused him. When he was 12 years old, he ran away and started working as a rent boy. It wasn’t long before he ended up in prison.
There are some who don’t ‘look the type’ to be in prison, and who had probably become involved in crime because of their friendship groups. There was a better chance that these ones could be rehabilitated with proper help and assistance. But there were others – ‘lifers’ – who were already so hardened by their mid-teens that, without a huge investment of resources, they were destined to spend the rest of their lives in and out of prison. The real problem lay with our failure as a society to provide sustained support to families and children with problems from the very earliest stages. ‘We are willing to put a lot of resources into dealing with the symptoms, but not into dealing with the root causes,’ Din said.
Tranter’s task is to engage people, particularly from the faith communities, who agree to mentor the young people when they leave prison. This provides the best hope of them not getting back into bad habits. When prisoners indicate that they want to make a new start in life, volunteers go every fortnight to meet with them, and give them practical help on how to manage life, apply for jobs and develop an after-prison life. Aspiration and hope may be intangible, but they are the key for many young offenders to cope and keep living.
Could forgiveness, another intangible, also be present in the criminal justice system? It can and should be, Tranter and Din agreed. Forgiveness and healing were two key words. But the main thing was that an offender should forgive himself. And for that he needed time for reflection and thinking. ‘It’s hard,’ Tranter said. ‘Many times we will not see the result of our work. It can be very frustrating, but I am sure we are sowing seeds for the future.’
English