We are all paying the price

I write in reply to the Mailbag from ‘name supplied’ of HMP Liverpool (‘It’s your lot’, April). Vulnerable Prisoners (VPs) attempting to have their voices heard. Why not? We are all paying the price for our crimes. A small majority of us are maintaining innocence. A case of the jury believing one statement over another. Do not make out that you are the pinnacle of criminals and you sit above VPs, as you are only a robber or a burglar or a drug dealer. We all have victims for our crimes, so how are you different to any other prisoner?

You talk about lives being ruined, but what about the drug dealer who sells drugs to a mother and father, and they then can’t afford to buy food for their kids? For the next month or so, their lives are ruined. Or the elderly person whose life savings you stole when you robbed their house? Or the wedding rings you stole, that they may have cherished for over 50 years? All to feed a habit. Or knocking seven bells out of your partner’s face because you felt like it – again, lives ruined.

The fact that you don’t see victims in your crimes obviously makes you deluded. The lives you have ruined have the same impact as all crime. But if you want some facts, instead of your righteous rants: VPs are less likely to return to crime than mains prisoners. Fact. VP prisons have significantly less violence in them than mains prisons, yet the prisoners are treated the same. Fact.

All crimes are different, but don’t kid yourself that you are any better than any other criminal. You are a criminal and that’s the bottom line. You are the embodiment of a criminal and that is all. Take a long glance at yourself in the mirror and attempt to see that you are no better or worse. Violence towards any human should not be condoned in any aspect of life, and no prisoners should have to carry out their sentence in fear while already serving their punishment in prison.