I had a call last week from my Ken, and he told me something
really interesting. He had not called in
a while so I had been worried that he was very down; he has served ten years
for joint enterprise murder and though coping well in the prison system I know
he just wants to come home, like all the JE inside campaigners. JENGbA’s
Birmingham co-ordinator Tim Caines (an innocent man who served 16 years joint
enterprise murder “with an unknown” as the victim was killed by a white man and
Tim is black) told me that after several years in prison no matter how much you
fight your wrongful conviction there comes a point when, for mental
self-preservation, you just have to get on with it.
Ken told me his HMP have educational days for students of criminology
and law from Universities where they are brought into the prison wings. However the students do not know what position
people hold within the jail. Ken is
extremely bright and also in his words ‘very regimented’ and so he often plays
the role of a prison officer. After 2
hours of showing the students the prison conditions and life behind cells they
then reveal who they really are. Ken
told me that all the students couldn’t believe he was a Prisoner, worse than
that, a convicted murderer. Many are
visibly moved and one woman wanted to hug him but he is not allowed a hug. When he goes on to explain his conviction
and joint enterprise he says that none of them, even though they may be going
into a legal profession have heard about the doctrine and how it is currently
being used.
The next day I received a call from a lovely grandma,
Kathleen Baptiste who I have not met but have spoken to many times. She and her niece are the only family
supporting her grandson Sebastian, and because she is waiting for an operation she
is too poorly to travel to HMP Gartree to visit and she was very worried because
she said he is feeling very low. Sebastian
like Ken was a young black Londoner who is in a prison in the north of England,
so much for keeping families connected to help rehabilitation. I have said we
will visit in the New Year.
The aunty of Jamal Parchment who called the day after asking
if we could visit her nephew in Ashworth.
Jamal sent us his artwork years ago and it is wonderful, but the toils
of being a beautiful artist and being innocently convicted have given him mental
health challenges. I promised her that
we would visit him but it is another maze of the prison system to get into a
High Security Hospital. But and this is
the beautiful bit, when Jamal was refused permission by the hospital for us to visit – he complained, first to his social
worker who said we weren’t family (In Ashworth you have to be a family member
or a supporting organisation) he
complained to his doctor who agreed we should be able to visit. His aunt said it’s the first time in years she
has seen him fight about his situation and so she was grateful that because of
JENGbA he was not giving up.
And then the heart breaking news a few weeks ago that Blue
Williams mum, Tara had killed herself because she couldn’t cope with her only
son’s wrongful conviction. His grandma
Sue contacted us and asked that we attend in our JENGbA tops. There was only a few of the JENGbA
campaigners able to make it but a photo journalist had been to our meetings as
she is so perplexed by joint enterprise – she asked could she come to the
funeral and Sue readily agreed. The
funeral was one of the most moving I have ever attended. Blue was brought in
handcuffed to a PO who, to be fair, was as respectful as he could be in such awful circumstances.
Sue said that Tara just felt let down every avenue she turned to in her fight
for justice for her son. She had given
one lawyer a huge amount of money only for him to go bankrupt shortly
after. Depression is a terrible illness
and one that affects many of the Inside and Outside JENGbA Campaigners which is
why we must support each other – this is what Sue wants to do. She said Tara wanted to fight by herself but
kept hitting obstacles, she is now going to take up that fight alongside JENGbA
and Blue is grateful, which is why they both agreed to the photojournalist
being there. The public need to see
man’s inhumanity to man when a young man has to be shackled to attend his mum’s
funeral.
A couple of days before Xmas, Roberto Parchment’s mum came
to my flat to upload a song she had made for all the JENGbA supporters on to
You Tube. Neither of us knew anything
about this technical feat so we needed IT support (my teenage son Dan) to do it
for us. The song “I raised my praise” is
really moving, please give it a listen.
So our JENGbA family needs to keep growing in strength and
commitment and let us all put shed loads of love out there to the brave and
vulnerable ones fighting for their freedom.
And that is my message for the New Year – we fight out here
together so Blue, Ken, Sebastian and Jamal and all our other Inside Campaigners
do not ever think they are alone or that their HOPE for justice was ever in
vain.
In solidarity
Gloria Morrison
JENGbA Campaign Co-ordinator
