Cath Staincliffe - The Kindest Thing

‘How many?’

‘Seventeen.’ He gives a rueful smile, like how did I get here? And the Prof smiles too.

‘In your experience, why do people choose to reply, ‘‘No comment’’?’

‘To avoid saying anything that may be used against them.’

I wonder if Mr Latimer will object to this: even though Bray’s answer is strictly true, it makes me sound like I had something to hide but he makes no move.

‘Ms Shelley failed to give an account of the circumstances surrounding her husband’s death?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Did she answer any questions about his illness?’

‘No.’

‘About the family circumstances?’

‘No.’

‘About her own movements on June the fifteenth last year?’

‘No.’ His tone doesn’t change: there’s a steady, slightly downbeat note to it, implying he was saddened but not surprised.

‘When you conveyed to the defendant the forensic evidence that gave rise to concerns, did she offer any explanation?’

‘No.’

‘Please will you explain to the court what effect refusing to answer questions has on the interview?’

‘It makes it uncomfortable for everyone. It is frustrating for us, the police, but it is also difficult for the person being interviewed.’

‘It requires a degree of determination?’

‘It does.’

‘Have you interviewed people before who have found it impossible to sustain offering no comment?’

‘Yes, on many occasions.’

‘Did Ms Shelley answer any questions at all in the course of three separate interviews?’

‘Not directly but she did say-’ Bray looks down at the transcript to check he gets it right. ‘‘‘I love my husband. I would never harm him.’’’

‘On the second of July last year you received notification that Ms Shelley was changing her story?’

‘That’s right.’

‘That she was admitting to manslaughter due to diminished responsibility?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is it the case that if Ms Shelley was found guilty of murder she would face a mandatory life sentence whereas manslaughter carries no mandatory sentence?’

‘That’s my understanding.’

‘In your professional opinion what would be the reason for Ms Shelley changing her story?’

‘The forensic evidence we have is compelling. It is hard to see what other defence might be accepted by the court.’

‘Thank you.’

The jury have hung on his every word but there is no flourish of pride in DS Bray’s evidence. That is why he is so dangerous.

Mr Latimer picks up the transcripts and grins wolfishly at DS Bray. ‘Thank you, DS Bray. Please will you turn to paragraph three on page four of the transcripts. Will you please read that for the court.’

DS Bray turns the pages. He looks across at Mr Latimer when he’s found the right place. His eyes lose a little of their sheen, or maybe that’s my wishful thinking.

‘‘‘Ms Shelley distressed. Interview suspended,’’’ he reads out.

‘Do you recall this?’

‘Yes.’

‘In what way did Ms Shelley demonstrate her distress?’

‘She was crying.’

‘She was crying.’ Mr Latimer repeats the answer and looks sad, as if he might too. ‘Was she calm?’

‘No, she was upset.’

‘Were you surprised?’

‘No. It was a distressing situation.’

‘In what respect?’

‘She was being asked questions about her husband’s death.’

‘Did you ask a doctor to attend to Ms Shelley?’

A slight hesitation, just a nanosecond but loud as a fart. ‘No.’

‘Even though she was so distraught that you had to stop the interview?’

‘If her solicitor had requested it we would have given any medical care required.’

‘Thank you. No further questions.’

Mousy looks disappointed. She liked DS Bray. Could have listened to him for longer.

The judge decides to call it a day. The jury rise and wind out of the court. He gathers various folders from his table and disappears out of his own door at the back of the room. Adam catches my eye, attempts a smile. I wink at him and he screws up his mouth as if he’s fighting a guffaw. Winking might send the wrong signal but I reckon with the jury out of the way it’s not going to affect my profile. The guard approaches and we set off. I’m taken downstairs and straight out to one of the vans parked on the side street. And back to Styal.

There are privileges with living in the houses – no official lights out, a kitchen where we can get drinks and make snacks and associate. We are not locked into our rooms at night – only the main door to the house is locked – and we are left alone then, though we can summon help by pressing the emergency call buttons. We are ‘free-flow’: trusted to move around specific parts of the prison complex without an officer escorting us. Women on the wing are escorted everywhere, their every movement checked. They have set times for exercise in their own concrete yard.

I saw inside the wing one day, accompanying an officer who was returning one prisoner and collecting another to come and work with me on the reading programme. The rectangular building is two storeys high; the cells run the length of each wall on both levels. The metal cell doors are thickly painted in garish primary colours: red, yellow, blue and green. It reminded me of a car ferry, the same preponderance of metal and the tough wipe-clean materials. Bad behaviour could see any of us sent to the wing and subject to an unforgiving system of reward and punishment: red and green cards. Red cards are issued for the slightest infringement of rules and if you accumulate three you are put into isolation, holed up in your cell day and night. Most of the suicides occur on the wing.

Some prisoners I never meet, the ones who are segregated in the modern block beyond the wing. These women never mingle with the general population. They are deemed either too dangerous or too vulnerable. They are escorted everywhere, many on twenty-four-hour suicide watch – they can’t even pee in private. Some are sex offenders who would be recognized. When possible the prison mixes ‘nonces’ with the general population, though, of course, the women know to lie about the crimes they’ve committed. Those who might be recognized, their faces familiar from news coverage, stay in segregation.

There are days when the whole prison feels pitched on the edge of hysteria. Four hundred and fifty women close to explosion, half of them suffering from PMT at the same time. A vertiginous mood. Though there seems no bent to riot. When the dam breaks it is usually individuals falling off, losing their tenuous grip, feeling their nails tear and their feet flail for purchase. They’re more likely to descend into madness or take a blade to their own flesh than attack their gaolers.

One night I woke to shouting. This was not the echoing chorus of women calling from building to building but something close and urgent, with the rhythm of violence. Before I had opened my door the alarm sounded, a deafening shrill in my ears. Someone had summoned the guards.

On the landing Gaynor was red-faced, screaming at Stephanie, the pretty young Afro-Caribbean girl she was sleeping with. There were plenty of trysts inside and they were tolerated by the staff. Stephanie’s face was swollen, one eye puffed up and bloody. Her nose was bleeding and her nightshirt patchy with dark stains.

‘Teach you a fuckin’ lesson,’ Gaynor continued to shout. Her fists were smeared with blood.

The guards burst in and we were roll checked, then sent to our rooms. There was more shouting, and banging as Gaynor was taken downstairs. From my window I watched them walking her down the hill to the wing. She was still cursing and voices began to call back in response from the black windows of the wing, the telegraph already spreading news of the attack.