VIOLENCE, VICTIMS AND
VALUES –
all three cry out for prison
abolition.
[abstract
Violence deters Anne Owers [Chief Inspector
of Prisons] from abolishing prisons.
Astonishingly, Ruth Morris’s top priority for
ending imprisonment is victim restoration.
Incarceration inexorably and intentionally
trashes Human Rights and civilised values,
every minute, every day. We all desperately
need releasing from prisons.
Violence however, is 100% curable. Treating
prisoners too violent for Broadmoor in
Parkhurst Prison, with the ‘healing hand of
kindness’, eliminated violence altogether.
Despite being scientifically proven – no alarm
bells rung for 3 years – a unique record worldwide for any maximum security wing – this fact
is counter-cultural and was and is being
politically suppressed. Videos show how
buried infantile rage can be accessed, and
evaporated.
Ruth Morris [a celebrated Canadian Quaker
abolitionist] argues that abolition benefits
victims. Her 5 points are knowingly
obstructed by retributive criminal justice –
and yet since victims suffer most, their
restoration must take priority over vengeance,
which simply doesn’t work.
Punishment (aka retribution or vengeance)
intentionally degrades human beings, inflicts
pain, reduces esteem, increases insecurity –
i.e. explicitly violating Human Rights and
corrupting civilised values. Curing violence
depends precisely on reversing all these, so
removing all underlying fears. Real ‘PlacesOf-Safety’ support, evoke and encourage
responsible, civilised behaviour – as
happened briefly in Parkhurst.
An ex-prisoner may be available to exemplify
this.
[200 words]
Dr Bob Johnson
Monday, 2 June 2008
BOB JOHNSON ICOPA XII -2008
Page 1 of 4
PRESS RELEASE
NIGHTMARE
PSYCHIATRY –
Want to leave hospital ?
– commit a crime first –
says psychiatrist.
Ex-prisoner’s story punches holes in
government policy & leaves habeas
corpus and orthodox psychiatric
thinking in tatters.
A bizarre and barbaric story carries disturbing
echoes of soviet-style psychiatry, while
bringing a police state that bit closer. Due for
release in August 2004, Scott Maloney, 27
years old, found himself subject to a peculiarly
British form of extraordinary rendition –
instead of liberty, he ended up Kafka-like in
July 2004 in Rampton maximum security
hospital. “How long will I be here?” he asked.
“How long is a piece of string” replied his
lawyer. “We’ll review your release after 8
years treatment” said his psychiatrist.
Maloney tried several methods for release.
Eventually, he invented a crime, for which he
was sentenced to three years. He’d achieved
what today’s psychiatry declined to offer – a
fixed term. His psychiatrist refused to release
him onto the street but agreed do so to the
police – he is now out of prison.
His case shows that psychiatric hospitals
operate on psychiatrists’ whims outside the
rule of law. The Mental Health Review
Tribunals (MHRT) set up under European Law,
routinely ignore the crucial criterion – mad
axemen may be incarcerated legally – but
only as long as they continue to be mad.
MHRTs’ release rate is reported at 10%
generally, falling to 1% in maximum security
hospitals, and to zero in Ashworth Hospital in
Liverpool, where every positive result is
Tuesday, 16 February 2016
negatively judicially reviewed at the behest of
the hospital solicitor.
Government policy invented the diagnosis of
‘Dangerous and Severe Personality Disorder
(DSPD)’ in December 2000 spending £270
million on 140 beds. These DSPD units ignore
the only scientifically proven way to remedy
Personality Disorders – the Therapeutic
Community approach. Scott Maloney will be
describing his experiences at the forthcoming
London conference, Creating a scandal –
prison abolition and the policy agenda ICOPA
XII – International Conference on Penal
Abolition 23, 24 & 25 July 2008 see
www.icopa12london.org.uk
Dr Bob Johnson
Friday, 13 June 2008
Consultant Psychiatrist,
P O Box 49,
Ventnor, Isle of Wight, PO38 9AA UK
An Inmate speaks about
Personality Disorder.
dysfunctional behaviour, addictions, extreme violence of
all different kinds. The trigger for the violence would be
when I would lose control, the emotional control. The
terror would come in. I created the violence as a tool to
kill the terror. Violence and anger for me were tools that I
used, they were the best friends that I had. They kept me
safe from the terror.
So I ended up in prison in 1990, for another violent
offence and I was given counselling. It didn’t work.
Nobody could get near. I’d lived with this terror for so
long that if anybody got near I was violent. I couldn’t stop
it. I didn’t know how to stop it. My natural reaction was
violent, because I felt comfortable, I felt safe. I was put
into a therapy group and that was the catalyst that caused
me to lose control. I could cope with what I had done
because I had anaesthetised myself to it and pushed it
away but I could not cope with what other people had
done and listening to what they had done. I found that in
listening to what other people had done I would feel
vulnerable and get back into being a child and identify
with the victim they were talking about and identify with
the woman they were talking about or the man they were
talking about. The terror started to come out in the group.
The violence started. I hated the anger and the violence
and I was frightening everybody in the group! I didn’t see
any of this! It was such a part of my life! However, the
group leaders saw this and they realised that it was a
problem in my childhood. I still, at this time, I didn’t
realise what was going on, it so controlled my mind. My
terror would not let me see what was wrong.
Conference transcript
March 2002
So they took me for one to one counselling in conjunction
with the group therapy. But it still wasn’t working.
Karl:
I’ve been in prison for twelve years now and I’m
still in prison. I came down from Edinburgh prison this
morning with a few particular things that I’d like to share
with you about personality disorder and how it was cured.
I said, “Well I know that you’re coming. You make an
appointment with me and tell me when you’re coming and
I can’t stop my mind preparing for you coming. I can’t
stop it. It’s impossible. So when you come for your
appointment, I’m frozen and you’re not getting near!” So I
said, “Don’t tell me when you’re coming. Just come into
the Hall and immediately go into the session.”
As I grew up, as a child, I lived with fear. I lived with fear
all my life. Mindless fear and terror. I didn’t know why.
When I was 21, I started to get into serious trouble, a lot
of violence, I ended up in prison. While I was in prison, I
started to get nightmares that I’d never had before and I
started going back into my childhood. I could always
remember my childhood up to the ages of about eight and
then about ten. Then there was a two year gap. I never
thought anything of it. As these nightmares started, I was
going back into that two years.
I found out that as I was going home from school one day,
as I was crossing this waste ground, a guy grabbed me and
pulled me into some bushes. He had a large knife, a large
steak knife, and he wanted to sexually abuse me. He had
this knife and he threatened to kill me. All these memories
came back. Right in the middle of what was going on, I
thought I was going to die. I had this huge weight on top
of me, this knife at my throat, and my mind shut off, just
cut out. I can remember everything up to that point, the
smells, the sounds, but I didn’t want to deal with it while I
was lying in this cell. It frightened me too much. I pushed
it away.
I got out of prison, went back to the same lifestyle:
violence, control, terror, living with this terror, and my
mind pushed it so far away that I didn’t remember it
anymore. This went on for many years, a lifestyle of
BOB JOHNSON ICOPA XII -2008
Page 2 of 4
They said to me, “Well, why isn’t this working?”
So that’s what they did and the first session I just
collapsed. I ended up on the floor, just sobbing on the
floor, I went immediately back in to that period in my
childhood where the abuse was happening. That was the
start of a progressive understanding because I had to let
the terror go. I realised that, when my mind had shut down
in the middle of my abuse, I thought I was going to die.
The terror was caused by that trauma. When I was losing
control, I was waking up in the middle of that abuse and
all my emotions were telling me that I was going to die
and that this person was on top of me. Now that wasn’t the
case but the trauma was telling me that! So, I had to
release that trauma and it took two years and a lot of hard
work and most of that was done behind a steel door
because I could not work with anyone in dealing with that
trauma at the beginning. It was so severe. I would just get
violent.
I found that the more I tried to deal with it, the more
physically ill I would become. I would get severe pains in
my head that would literally drop me to the floor. I would
vomit all over the floor, blood would come out of my
nose. I ended up in hospital and this would go on for a
long time. It was only when I slowly released the terror
Tuesday, 16 February 2016
that I learned to interact emotionally with other people. I
found that the one to one counselling dealt with the
damaged child, which allowed me to go into the group
therapy and emotionally educate the adult. It had to be that
way. I could not go and deal with the adult and work back
the way because the child was creating the aggression and
the terror that was keeping everyone away.
I went right through the prison system and I was being
assessed for release and that was when my problems really
started. I’d been working with people for ten years. I had
an excellent record of work and therapy. My security
review said: this man is now little risk to the public.
However I came up against psychiatrists and
psychologists who depended on the Hare Psychopathy
Checklist. Despite the fact that I had an excellent record,
and was assessed positively for release – they contradicted
my whole record using the Psychopathy Checklist. They
said “This man is in the top 5% most dangerous prisoners
in Scotland and he should never be released.”
But I had reports from everyone else, including
psychologists and psychiatrists, that did not have any
dependence on Hare or other absolute tools. It just didn’t
add up. So I’d heard of Bob and I asked Bob to come and
assess me and he came. The Parole Board read his report
and said they accepted it.
One thought that I’d like to leave you with is this: it took
me forty years to come home from school. The people
who brought me home were not highly trained
professionals, psychologists, psychiatrists, psychosexual
counsellors or whatever, they were just two ordinary
people: a basic grade prison officer and a middle aged
social worker, who saw what was being triggered off in
me and decided to do something about it. That was not
normal practice in the type of therapy that was offered at
that time. It didn’t deal with childhood issues that
surfaced. The normal practice just dealt with a set
programme. It’s now becoming more a part of the
programme that, if something surfaces, it needs to come
out: you need one to one counselling in addition to group
therapy.
It’s completely gone now, totally gone!
That’s the part that I wanted to impress upon you today,
that nothing in the prison system worked. You could have
locked me up, you could have done anything you wanted
to, it wouldn’t have worked. The more you’d have tried to
use force and coercive control methods the more I would
fight you because I didn’t know how to do anything else.
All I knew was how to get angry because that made me
safe and it kept me comfortable. I will leave you with that
one thought, that it wasn’t highly skilled people that
helped me, it was just two ordinary people who saw a
wounded kid. Thank you.
Bob Johnson: Well if this isn’t, as the title says:
“Successful work with Personality Disorders”, I don’t
know what is. Wonderful! I want to revisit two parts of
that story which are absolutely typical. I’ll take the last
one first. I’m afraid a lot of the training tends to
dehumanise. I think it’s a fundamental flaw in the
training.
What we’re presenting here, what we’re finding, is an
analysis of what happened. Karl was saying that “my
BOB JOHNSON ICOPA XII -2008
Page 3 of 4
mind shut down, I turned to the violence”. He said that
violence made him feel comfortable. I would say that it
shut the mind down – make a lot of noise, make a lot of
anger – cover up the fear. Is that right?
Karl:
That’s correct.
Bob:
When I saw Karl, I looked for these
factors. When I started working at Parkhurst with very
violent prisoners, I worked on the basis that they didn’t
want to be violent, there was something underneath. That
there was something that was preventing them from being
non violent, some fear and some terror. I would develop
an approach where I would focus, ask people. When I got
a referral from a solicitor to come and see Karl, I looked
for some terror that had driven the violence because my
model is that human beings are basically born nonviolent. If they’re being violent, they have to find out
why.
I can see that Karl has obviously read my book before I
wrote it! (Laughter). It’s so clear. If Karl can think straight
then he’s not going to terrify people. If he can’t think
straight, then he will use anything to stop him from
thinking things through.
Karl:
I was dysfunctional in relationships,
especially with men. If men stepped within certain
barriers, I had to get them out. It wasn't them that
bothered me, it was what was being triggered off inside
me, that was bothering me. So I would just show violence.
I wouldn’t even know why I was doing it. I had to get
away. I was also dysfunctional with women because there
comes the point in a relationship when you need to
interact emotionally, you have to give and take. I could
only take. If I started to give, I started to become
emotionally vulnerable. The terror was triggered off. It
was an endless cycle of dysfunctionally failed
relationships.
Bob:
And again, there were one or two of
your colleagues, if I could refer to them that way, that I’ve
seen in a similar context, one of whom, particularly,
comes to mind. He went on this sex offender treatment
programme [(SOTP) I don’t hold a very high opinion of it,
generally] after which nothing happened. So he went on it
again! (laughter). I thought to myself oh gee! But the
second time round … like you said, you go into the group,
you can’t stand the group, gradually, you reasoned it out.
Karl:
Yes, I’d reasoned it out because the
more the terror was provoked, the more I was forced to
deal with it, when I realised what was happening.
All my life I couldn’t read a newspaper story or watch a
television story if someone, a woman or a child was killed
in an accident or a house fire or anything like that because
it was triggering off what was in me. If I picked a paper up
and that was the story, I would immediately turn the page.
If it came on the news, I would get up and walk away.
These things were subconscious. I didn’t realise that I was
doing it. I couldn’t cope with any of these things and it
was only when I went into the group and I heard other
people talking about these things, I had no defence! It got
through and I wanted to attack them and to hurt them! I
mean, they threw me out a few times. The understanding
was progressive, as I began to clear the terror. Before I
couldn’t think properly, there was a vice on my mind. I
couldn’t function properly. I couldn’t talk, I was
Tuesday, 16 February 2016
uneducated, I couldn’t stand being in the company of
groups of people, of adults. I just didn’t know what to do.
But I found that when the vice was released in my mind, I
found that I had a brain that I could use. I found that it was
easy to study. I could do a lot of other things that I’d never
been able to do, that came quite easily.
Bob:
“Vice on his mind” …. that’s it! I talk
about “frozen terror” and there you have it! I didn’t tell
Karl it was frozen terror. But I picked it up when I talked
to him, he described it so clearly. And what is it? It’s
trauma during childhood! Guess what! Children are
impressionable! They’re vulnerable! And how do they
deal with trauma? They say, “It didn’t happen!”, they
block it out.
Karl had no recollection. Had I seen him in what we may
call his infant phase, I’d have said, “what happening?” and
he’d have said “I don’t want to talk to you!”. Fine, and I
would just persist, as with Jamie. With Jamie, I kept
saying “Jamie, what’s going on? Lets get to the bottom of
it!”
Now the other thing that I want to emphasise is, you’re
through! You’re out the other end! You don’t need any
violence, or this reputation you had, it’s gone. It’s
evaporated! What do you need it for?
Karl:
You don’t need it. Over the years I’ve
known some very violent men in prison, who are well
known by the media, who think they’re really hard men.
And they’re not. They’re just frightened individuals
inside, because so many of them have been traumatised
and that’s the way they function, through that violence.
There other men being set free through the same
procedure, men who had been diagnosed as psychopathic
killers, never to be released from prison.
The
transformation in them is unbelievable. But Hare would
have kept them in using these absolute assessment tools
that admit to no possibility of change. They’d spend the
rest of their lives in jail, but they’ve gone free!
Bob:
I have to say something about Professor
Robert Hare! He’s a professor of psychiatry, in British
Columbia. His position is that once you are a psychopath
- that’s it! Forever! So this checklist, the PCL-R, is used
to decide whether you are in the bucket marked
‘psychopath’ or not, and if you are, well you can forget it!
If you are trained this way, then you give the tests – there
are twenty items, you tick them, “is he glib? - A
pathological liar? - Callous? - grandiose?” And so on!
Tick the boxes, enter the scores 0, 1 or 2, add them up. If
they are over thirty, then throw away the key! I’ve sat in
a Sheriff’s Court in Scotland, much as Karl did, and the
psychologist reads his report that he’s one of “the most
dangerous men, the top 5%”. Where are the twenty prison
officers holding him down so he doesn’t attack them?
Similar to yourselves, we were just sitting there normally,
because he was no longer a threat! But the Hare
Psychopathy scale said mark the word Psychopath across
his forehead!
This is an ethos that needs changing. This is the wrong
view of human beings! If human beings can choose, if
human beings have intent, then human beings can change!
They may be difficult to change, they may take a while to
change, that doesn’t matter! The expectation should be,
“Here you are Karl. You are being violent. A better
situation is a non-violent Karl. What do you think?” You
BOB JOHNSON ICOPA XII -2008
Page 4 of 4
engage Karl in a rational discussion, you listen to what he
says, he thinks it through, he gets it. He goes back to his
cell and he finds that he’s been getting angry in the group,
he feels his anger and his tension, but there’s nothing
happening in the group. What’s going on? He’s thinking it
through, rationally. He’s digging it out. Something is there
that is wrong and he’s sorting it out. Fantastic!
Karl: I’d like to say a few words about this terror
because it’s so important. This terror is literally mind
numbing. Literally. It can drop you to the ground. It can
drive you into all kinds of illnesses in trying to release it.
When I ended up in the prison hospital, I was so ill. My
body was swelling up, I had various problems and they
said to me, “You’re allergic to something” and I went
through this process every time I tried to deal with the
problem. They kept telling me that I was allergic and I
needed an anti-histamine! I said to them that the only
thing that I was allergic to was Professor Hare! (laughter).
Once that terror is released, for those men in prison,
believe me, you wouldn’t know them, they’re so gentle, so
kind. The thing they always wanted to be. Yet, before they
were treated and set free, you could not talk to these men,
they were so dangerous to everyone round about them and
they could take your life without batting an eyelid! They
were so damaged.
Bob:
Well, thank you so much Karl. That was
wonderful! Thanks very much!
Dr Bob Johnson
Consultant Psychiatrist,
P O Box 49, Ventnor, Isle of Wight, PO38 9AA
UK
e-mail DrBob@TruthTrustConsent.com
www.TruthTrustConsent.com
GMC speciality register for psychiatry
reg. num. 0400150
formerly
Head of Therapy, Ashworth Maximum
Security Hospital, Liverpool
Consultant Psychiatrist,
Special Unit, C-Wing, Parkhurst Prison, Isle of Wight.
MRCPsych (Member of Royal College of Psychiatrists),
MRCGP (Member of Royal College of General
Practitioners).
Diploma in Psychotherapy Neurology & Psychiatry
(Psychiatric Inst New York),
MA (Psychol), PhD(med computing), MBCS, DPM, MRCS.
Author Emotional Health ISBN 0-9551985-0-X
Author Unsafe at any dose ISBN 0-9551985-1-8
author of "curing mental pain 1" at --
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=15805
50859337309430&hl=en-GB
Monday, 21 July 2008
Tuesday, 16 February 2016