RECENT TREATMENT OF CHARLES BRONSON
by Mal
(8th May 2010)

“CHARLES BRONSON: THE MOST VIOLENT/DANGEROUS PRISONER IN ENGLAND!”

That’s what you will always see in any piece of reportage about Charlie Bronson. Have a scan through the news cuttings on this site. Have a look at the recent ones featuring his art work and his charitable donations. The label is always there. It’s an old label but it helps sell newspapers, so they keep it alive and helps to perpetuate the myth in the eyes of the public.

The great British public read that line; they read that he has spent 35 years in prison; they read that 31 of those years have been spent in solitary … and they think. They think: What sort of a monster must he be? They equate him with Charles Manson (someone that many people confuse him with), Ian Huntley, Myra Hindley, the real live Hannibal, Robert Maudsley who ate another prisoner's brains. REAL MONSTERS!

To demonstrate ordinary peoples' attitudes to these sort of prisoners I can tell you that I was recently inundated with mail from far and wide when another prisoner recently slashed Ian Huntley’s neck. Overwhelmingly, the flavour was “He should have cut deeper” “He should have done the job properly!” “Why did they save Huntley’s life?”

The truth is that Charles Bronson has never killed anyone. He has never harmed a single hair on the head of a child or a woman. His list of crimes on the outside of prison is an extremely short one and in not one of those cases was anyone harmed in any way. In the original case of armed robbery that he was jailed for in 1974 his gun wasn't even loaded. He has hurt other prisoners in the past though. Mainly paedophiles, women killers and rapists. The sort of prisoners that ordinary law-abiding men and women say “I’d like to spend five minutes in a sound proof room with!”

Up until 22nd April 2009 Charlie was relatively happy in the segregation unit at HMP Wakefield. Well, as happy as you can be in solitary confinement. He got along with the screws, he was treated well and wasn't interfered with, mail passed freely back and forth, he could make a few phone calls a week (he used to phone me for up to 35 minutes), he created his art and sent it out to all his friends. PO's I spoke with there had a respect for him and he respected them. There had not been a violent incident for years.

Then he was suddenly moved to HMP Long Latin for no apparent reason.

But there was a reason: the prison service were not at all happy with the release of the film Bronson. They were not happy that he made fools of them by smuggling a tape out that was played at the premier. They were not at all happy with the way the film portrayed their treatment of Charlie; treatment that anyone who has spent significant time at Her Majesty’s pleasure will tell you is common. There are decent prison officers and there are bullies. Bullies who delight in having captive victims who have no way of escaping their malicious fists, boots and sticks.

If you are at all dubious about my assertion here then please read "The Loose Screw" by Jim Dawkins.

It was time to punish Charlie. To show him who is the boss and make him pay for the publicity he received as a result of the success of the film … and to pay for the adverse, albeit truthful, way they were portrayed.

If you've read the book "Bronson" or any of the other auto-biographies/biographies, you'll know how many times and how frequently Charlie used to be moved between prisons. It's called "ghosting" and they often do it to punish or destabilise and upset an inmate.

Charlie had his art equipment taken away from him in Long Lartin - a deliberate move designed to upset him, as his art and his fitness regime are the only things he has to do to while away the 23 hours he spends alone every day of every month of every year. He also appears to have been put on short rations, as he lost two and a half stone in weight while there. He officially complained about this. He was being given a cold cheese roll for his evening meal and that had to last him until breakfast time the next morning. Do you know what their cheeky answer was? “To help you out Charlie we’ll give you TWO cheese rolls for your evening meal!”

After having no trouble at all for a number of years suddenly he had two confrontations with the Mufti Squad ... confrontations that Charlie always comes out of with multiple injuries. He was pissing blood while there.

Then another move in November 2009 to HMP Woodhill. This looked at first like a good move for him. The governor announced that he was to be allowed open visits for the first time in many, many years. But then the games started. They banned him from sending his art out to people. Anyone who knows him knows that his art has become incredibly important to him. It’s the only way he can really express himself and it gives him tremendous satisfaction. Sales of his art have been a way of raising money for charity for many years.

He is in the segregation wing with five other prisoners. Those other five are allowed to associate with one another, but Charlie is kept locked up.

For the past few months they have been playing havoc with his post. It has been taking up to six weeks for his letters to reach the world outside the prison and similar amounts of time for letters to reach him. They have also been stopping letters reaching him and stopping many of his letters coming out. I have had so many emails from his friends asking why he had stopped writing to them.

For those of you in that position I need to explain something: if they stop your letter reaching Charlie then they give him a form saying that the letter was stopped and the letter is placed into his property box. They will not inform you that they have prevented Charlie from reading your letter. They can also stop the letter that Charlie writes to you telling you that he didn't receive yours. With me so far? I'm afraid you may never know that your communication with Charlie was interrupted by the prison and simply assume that Charlie just stopped writing to you. Potentially Charlie just lost a friend or a supporter!

It is a well documented fact that communication with family, friends and loved ones is good for prisoners. Numerous independent studies have proved that it significantly reduces the chance of re-offending after release. Studies have also shown that prisoners isolated from such communication are far more likely to re-offend. Prison authorities are very well aware of these facts, so why would they go to so much trouble to disrupt Charlie's mail? I think by now you may be starting to understand why.

He has now been placed in a cell with no window and only a mould covered mattress to sleep on. When his cell door is opened he is greeted by twelve officers in riot gear because they know that their treatment of him will cause his to kick off soon.

Then, last Friday, the day before he was due to visit his brother Charlie, Mark Peterson received a phone call from the prison telling him that the visit had been cancelled and he was banned for life from visiting or communicating with his brother. The reason given was that he had spoken to the media about Charlie! Within a day I, along with some dozen other high profile supporters, had received the same message.

“Why are they doing this?” you ask. “Why would they want to upset Charlie?”

Well, the answer is quite simple. Charlie has been good for too long for their liking. There is a chance that he could be allowed to go free at one of his parole hearings. But the prison authorities know how Charlie reacts when they press his buttons. They know that if they goad him enough he will give the only reaction left open to him. His fuse will eventually shorten and he will act violently. All his peaceful work of the past few years will be undone at a stroke. In that way they can clearly demonstrate that he is still a danger and justify keeping him in solitary confinement in prison as a Cat 'A' prisoner for the foreseeable future. That is vindictive to say the least.

It had been a long time since such an incident, as Charlie has been working towards losing his Cat 'A' status and being released, so it has taken a lot of "poking with a stick" to get him to react. But last Friday he finally reacted after being told about his brother’s ban and smashed some stuff ... but he did not harm or threaten to harm any people. The prison's response seems to have been totally illegal. I am told that they set an attack dog on him when he was wearing nothing but a pair of shorts. I understand that Charlie was bitten by the dog before it eventually ran away from him.

Ideally, I believe, the prison would like to push Charlie into taking another hostage (it's been over ten years since the last one) or a roof top protest. That would get him into the national newspapers for all the wrong reasons ... but then that appears to be what sells newspapers and that would inform the public that they are fully justified in keeping him locked up.

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I just want to finish off by assuring you that I am not a naive or gullible youngster, in awe of a famous criminal or in search of fame or glory for myself. I have been good friends with Charlie for almost ten years and we have shared a great deal. I have visited him on numerous occasions and we have spent dozens and dozens of hours speaking on the telephone. I am aware of all the charities he has helped and contributed to over the years. While I have never been arrested or spent a single day in prison I know many people who have. I am simply an ordinary bloke who believes that a great injustice is being done and will continue to be done while the public remain ignorant of the facts.