A Group in Prison

Abstract

Some twenty years ago, together with Adrian Arnold, then Deputy Governor of Her Majesty's Prison, Pentonville, I conducted what was primarily intended as a staff-support group for prison officers. Each of the officers was paired with a prison visitor with whom he took a small group of inmates for an hour per week to give them an opportunity to improve communication. The idea was that if the prisoners could learn to express in words some of their powerful feelings of rage, resentment and frustradion, there would be less need to express them through violence against others or themselves. It was a vital aspect of prison management, often forgotten today, that good communication between staff and inmates could lead to better understanding between them and it was also a valuable form of staff-training.