News

Our January 2015 eBulletin now available

Monday, 2 February 2015

WHAT HAVE WE BEEN UP TO?

Police racism and spying in the spotlight
Baroness Doreen Lawrence is one of a number of brilliant speakers we and The Monitoring Group have lined up for our joint conference on police corruption, racism and spying. Read what the The Guardian has to say about it here.

Empower. resist, transform
We've produced a new publication as part of our Justice Matters for Women project. It features essays by our Senior Research Associate Rebecca Roberts, Research Associate Helen Mills, and Women in Prison's Policy and Campaigns Manager Laurel Townhead.

Answering the Big Questions
Our Director Richard Garside appeared on BBC's The Big Questions and BBC News, and was quoted on the BBC website in relation to the controversy surrounding the future of Ched Evans.

Strip-searching of children in police stations should only be used as a last resort
Richard was also one of the co-signatories to a letter published in The Guardian calling for strip-searcing of children in police stations to be used only as a last resort. 

Women for refugee Women
Our Project Assistant Abi Amey went to the launch of a new report by Women for Refugee Women about conditions in UK immigration detention. You can read more about it here.

HAVE YOU SEEN?

Britain's secret penal system
​Benefits claimants are subjected to an 'amateurish, secret penal system which is more severe than the mainstream judicial system', writes Dr David Webster of the University of Glasgow.

Buy none, get ten free!
We've put the ten most popular articles from our magazine, Criminal Justice Mattersup for free! Because we're nice like that.

The dizzy heights of criminology fame
Following his stratospheric rise to fame after his headline-grabbing article about Muslim victimsation in the British Journal of Criminology, Julian Hargreaves briefly came back to earth to fill us in on what it's like to hit the big time.

Helping, hurting, holding
The latest instalment from Mike Guilfoyle about his time as a probation officer. This one is about 'Marcus', who had a traumatic childhood and struggled with alcohol problems. 

An alternative model of positive youth justice
Professor Kevin Haines and Dr Stephen Case think that the youth justice jystem of England and Wales is not fit for purpose. Here they discuss an alternative model they call Children First, Offenders Second.

Why do people confess to crimes they haven't committed?
Catriona Havard and Kim Drake, from our partner organisation the International Centre for Comparative Criminological Research, have written about false confessions.

Prison Service Journal
The latest edition of the Prison Service Journal is out now. It includes articles based around the 2014 Perrie Lectures, on 'Making sense of life sentences'.

COMING SOON

Police Corruption, spying, racism and accountability
An impressive line-up of speakers - including Baroness Doreen Lawrence, Mark Thomas, John McDonnell MP and Imran Khan - will be speaking at a unique two-day conference we are holding with The Monitoring Group on Friday 6 and Saturday 7 February. The conference will seek common ground between families, community workers, journalists, academics, lawyers and affected communities, to understand and challenge the problem of police corruption, spying and racism.

TAKE A LOOK AT THIS.......

Best of the brainboxes
Here's some of the best reading we've found this month written by academics.

Your home is your prison
Maya Schenwar in Nation of Change writes about how new technologies allow the spread of imprisonment beyond the prison.

Twaddle masquerading as serious comment
Former prisoner, Alex Cavendish, offers his assessment of the ITV show, Bring Back Borstal, on his Prison UK blog.

Reducing prison violence
The CEO of Leap Confronting Conflict, Thomas Lawson, writes about a pilot programme his organisation is running to reduce prison violence.

IN THE NEWS.......

UnJust solutions
The Guardian reports that the new commercial arm of the Ministry of Justice, Just Solutions International, has entered into the running for a contract to sell British prison expertise to the Saudi Arabian prison service. A conflict of interest, argues Jack of Kent. A necessary evil, writes prison consultant Rob Allen.

Shocking rise in violence, suicide and self-harm
84 people killed themselves in custody in England and Wales last year, The Independent reports. This compared with 75 in 2013. The new figures also showed rises in self-harm, violence and sexual assaults.

NUMBERS OF THE MONTH

1,122,526 The number of sanctions imposed on benefit claimants by the Department for Work and Pensions in Great Britain in 2013. 

849,000 The number of court ordered fines imposed in Great Britiain in 2013.

£72,000 The cost to the taxpayer of Chris Grayling's failed attempt to uphold his unlawful prisoner book ban.

QUOTE OF THE MONTH

'If we hadn’t introduced police and crime commissioners and established the College of Policing, we wouldn’t have been able to break the unaccountable ACPO monopoly at the head of policing in this country.'

Theresa May, speaking at the Police Federation conference in May 2014.


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This bulletin was compiled and edited by Matt Ford and Rebecca Roberts. We are always keen to hear from our readers. For comments and feedback email matt.ford@crimeandjustice.org.uk.

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