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involved in, Frank's case. If you want to be removed from the newsletter distribution list,
just send an email saying so. Otherwise, you will continue to receive it from time to time
with news of any developments. Past newsletters can be viewed from the Newsdesk page on the
web site.
Campaign news
The broader campaign
Behind the campaign to get justice for Frank Wilkinson, there is a broader campaign. In many ways, Frank's case is typical of other
miscarriage of justice cases in our country. Since becoming actively involved in trying to get justice for Frank, I have come to
appreciate how the various elements of our criminal justice system - the police, the judiciary, the prisons and the appeal system -
have all developed in ways that, taken together, make it frighteningly easy for someone to find themselves in jail an innocent person
yet frighteningly difficult to get out again, either by proving their innocence or even by serving their time. (Frank is more than 3
years over his original tariff and is far from unusual in this.)
A couple of outstanding pieces of research in this field - "You Be The Judge" by L.A. Naylor and "No Smoke" by Sandra Lean - ought
to be compulsory reading for those within the system or with any interest in seeing that justice is properly administered in our
country. This is not a question of being soft or letting criminals off - it is a question of making sure that those who actually
committed the crime are caught and dealt with appropriately. For every innocent person in our prisons, there is a guilty person
still walking the streets, free to commit further crimes.
London Against Injustice meeting at the House of Commons
On Thursday November 26th, London Against Injustice held the first of a planned series of meetings in the House of Commons to
highlight to MPs the plight of prisoners maintaining innocence. In the interests of the broader campaign, I went along.
(You can see the meeting flyer here.)
The focus of this first meeting was on the role of the police in helping to create miscarriages of justice, gaining convictions
both by failing to disclose evidence to the defence and by using uncorroborated evidence. Although MPs were a bit thin
on the ground (just 4 attended*), the indefatigable Bruce Kent, who chaired the meeting, saw this as a promising start to spreading
awareness of miscarriages of justice. Meetings of this sort, attended as they are by those with all-too-personal experience of such
cases, can be a real eye-opener to the uninitiated.
One outcome of the meeting is the publication of a list of recommendations drawn up by London Against Injustice and designed to tackle
these two areas of police behaviour - you can read the recommendations
here. We were all encouraged to publicise these recommendations so far as we could and I would urge the parliamentary friends on our
distribution list to do whatever they can on this.
* These 4 were Karen Buck, David Burrowes, Susan Kramer and John McDonnell - I hope they don't mind my including them on this
distribution!
Frank news
Sentence Planning Board
Frank had been told he would be attending a Risk Assessment Board on Wednesday November 18th, and had been a
little confused about this since he'd already been before one this year (here are his thoughts in anticipation). It was a pleasant surprise for him, therefore, when
this turned out to be a Sentence Planning Board - and one conducted in an entirely different atmosphere to those
he had previously attended. (You can read his account of the meeting here - and you can read the extract from "Abuse of Justice", Frank's prison autobiography,
that he gave the panel to read here.)
The outcome of the meeting was that Frank be assessed for the CSCP course as soon as possible - the expectation being
that the assessment would find he had no need of the course, being so obviously a changed person. The Board was
impressed by the length of time it has been since Frank was in any sort of trouble or exhibited any signs of violence -
possibly they appreciate just how difficult this can sometimes be in the hothouse of everyday prison existence, where
frustration and provocation can be extreme.
(The Cognitive Self Change Programme is one of the plethora of Offender Behaviour
Programmes that prisoners are expected to go on these days in order to demonstrate that their risk to society has been
sufficiently reduced to warrant being progressed within the system. Attendance on these courses is often the only evidence of
reduced risk that is accepted as being "real" - this despite the fact that the effectiveness of these courses is hotly disputed
by psychologists outside the rather hermetic world of the prison psychologist. If you're interested, you can find outlines of
these courses here.)
Transfer request - the saga continues
The last newsletter told how Frank's request for a transfer to a lower category prison, submitted in July,
had become lost in the system and how he had had to submit a second request. On November 5th, several months
after the initial request had been submitted, Frank at last received acknowledgement from the prison's "Head
of Residence" that his request was being actively considered. Apparently, his application "will be discussed
on the next board after Sentence Planning targets are clarified" - nothing happens quickly in the Prison Service.
- If, as seems likely, the purpose of the Sentence Planning Board was to "clarify" Sentence Planning
targets (in line with the intention of the Head of Residence quoted above)
- If the board's recommendation that Frank be assessed for the CSCP (Cognitive Self Change Programme)
is actually followed through
- If the assessment finds, in line with the board's expectation, that there is no need for Frank to do
this course since he is so evidently a changed person
- If the Transfer Board then meets to discuss Frank's transfer request and finds that all requirements
have been met
...then Frank might, in the forseeable future, be on his way to a non-Category A prison for the first time in over 24 years -
but that's a lot of "Ifs"!
Appeal progress
Now that Frank's case is being actively reviewed by the CCRC, we will be completely in the dark until a decision has been
made as to whether or not to refer the case back to the Court of Appeal, which is likely to be at least several months and
could be several years in the future. The CCRC process is what we in the world of IT refer to as a "black box" process - you
can see what information goes in and what information comes out, but the information processing itself is a mystery. There
are, however, a couple of recent developments concerning the information we want to input into the process.
The first of these concerns a new witness who, having seen details of Frank's case on the website, has come forward with new
information. To have new evidence that was unavailable at the time of the original trial may help us pass one of the acid
tests of the Court of Appeal and so is very welcome. The CCRC have been informed and we will just have to wait and see what
they will make of this new evidence.
The second development is in the hunt for details of a trial that took place over 30 years ago and which may be helpful to
Frank's case. Frank's legal team require the case number in order to track these details down. Enquiries at the Crown Court
in question have drawn a blank, as have enquiries of the National Archive at Kew. However, initial enquiries of HM Court Service
have proved slightly more promising - we shall see. In the meantime, if anyone has any ideas as to where else we could look
in order to find the case number - we have the name of the Crown Court, the names of two of the defendants, the nature of the
offence and the year of the trial - please offer them up!
Prison number
After over 24 years in prison with the same prison number - R60852 - Frank has been given a brand new number - A9481AG.
This is apparently part of a prison-wide scheme to allocate new numbers to all prisoners, though Frank has no idea why.
(One immediate result has been that the computer system controlling prisoners' finances crashed soon afterwards!) Frank
makes the point that his old number was meaningful - it told where he was convicted and roughly when. However, as far as
he can tell, the new number tells nothing - but perhaps it is somehow more meaningful to others?