Production roles- ID badges

Today I creaated the ID badges for the prison officers: I used the computer to create the design, before printing them on paper and backing them on card. J used a college ID badge to match the size and cut them out to fit: below is during the making of the ID's

Women Murderers

Joanne Dennehy: The woman who murdered men 'for fun'

"After killing her third victim, Joanne Dennehy phoned her friend and sang the Britney Spears track "Oops I Did It Again" down the line. Only she knows for sure why she embarked on her killing spree but police believe the best explanation is she was simply having 'fun' " - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25669206

Women in Prison

Women’s prison population

• Women represent around 5% of the overall prison population in the the UK.
• The number of women in prison in England and Wales stood at 3, 952 on 11 October 2013.
• A total of 9,832 women were received into custody in 2012.
• Women accounted for 9% of all prison receptions in the 12 months leading up to March 2013.
• Between 1995 and 2010 the female prison population increased with 115%.
• Most of the rise in the female prison population can be explained by a significant increase in the severity of sentences. In 1996, 10% of women convicted of an indictable offence were sent to prison, in 2010 14% were.

Women prisoner backgrounds

• Over half of women in prison report having suffered domestic violence.
• One in three women in prison report having suffered sexual abuse.
• 53% of women in prison report having experienced emotional, physical or sexual abuse during childhood.
• 19% of women were not in permanent accommodation before entering custody and 10% of women were sleeping rough.
• 31% women in prison have spent time in local authority care as a child.
• Nearly 40% of women in prison left school before the age of 16 years, almost one in 10 were aged 13 or younger.
• 30% of women were permanently excluded from school.

Custodial sentences and previous convictions

• The majority of women sentenced to prison (81%) have committed a non-violent offence. 
• Women serve shorter prison sentences than men and for less serious offences. In the 12 months ending March 2013, 59% of women entering prison under sentence served sentences of up to and including six months.
• Theft and handling was by far the most common offence, accounting for 38% of all sentenced women in the year leading up to March 2013.
• 26% of women in prison had no previous convictions – more than double the figure for men (12%).
• 28% of women serving sentences of under 12 months had no previous convictions, compared with only 12% of men.

Women prisoners, mental health and self-harm 

• Women account for a disproportionate amount of self-harm in prison; depite making up only 5% of the population, women account for 28% of self-harm incidents.
• Women in custody are five times more likely to have a mental health concern than women in the general population.
• 30% of women (as compared to 10% of men) have had a previous psychiatric admission before they come into prison.
• Of all the women who are sent to prison, 46% say they have attempted suicide at some time in their life. 51% have severe and enduring mental illness, 47% have a major depressive disorder, 6% have a psychosis and 3% have schizophrenia.
• 83% of women in prison stated that they had long-standing illness, compared with 32% of the general female population. 73% were on medication on arrival at prison – mainly benzodiazepines (42%), methadone (36%), antidepressants (14%), and sleeping pills (10%).
• Women prisoners are subject to higher rates of disciplinary proceedings than men. According to the Ministry of Justice, “women may be less able (due for example to mental health issues) to conform to prison rules.”

Deaths in custody

• In the year leading up to March 2013, six women died in custody. 
• There were 94 self-inflicted deaths of women prisoners between 1990 and 2012.
• Approximately 30% of prisoners who take their own lives had no family contact prior to their deaths.

Women prisoners, drugs and alcohol

• In 2010, 24% of women in prison were serving sentences for drug offences.
• Prior to imprisonment, 85% of women were smokers, 75% had used illegal drugs and 40% drank alcohol in excess of the recommended limits.
• 52% of women surveyed said that they had used heroin, crack, or cocaine in the four weeks prior to custody. However, practitioners report that women may hide or underplay substance misuse through fear of losing their children.

 

Imprisoned mothers and their children

• It is estimated that more than 17,240 children were separated from their mothers in 2010 by imprisonment.
• Only 9% of children whose mothers are in prison are cared for by their fathers in their mothers' absence.
• At least a fifth of women prisoners are lone parents before imprisonment, compared to 9% of the general population.
• It is estimated that four out of 10 young women in prison are mothers.
• Only half of the women who had lived with or were in contact with their children prior to imprisonment had received a visit since going to prison.
• Maintaining contact with children is made more difficult by the distance that many prisoners are held from their home area. This is particularly acute for women given the limited number of women’s prisons; the average distance from home is 60 miles for women; in 2009 753 women were held over 100 miles from home.
• One Home Office study showed that for 85% of mothers, prison was the first time they had been separated from their children for any significant length of period.
• Imprisoning mothers for non-violent offences has a damaging impact on children and carries a cost to the state of more than £17 million over a ten year period.

 On release

• Around one-third of women prisoners lose their homes, and often their possessions, while in prison.
• A Prisons Inspectorate survey found that 38% of women in prison did not have             accommodation arranged on release.

 

Reconviction and reoffending

• Almost half of women leaving prison are reconvicted within one year – for those serving sentences of less than 12 months this increases to 62%. For those women who have served more than 11 previous custodial sentences the reoffending rate rises to 75%.
• 58% of women identified unemployment and lack of skills as problems contributing to their offending.

 Community Solutions

• In 2011 a higher proportion of women than men completed their community sentence successfully or had their sentences terminated for good progress on both community orders (70%) and suspended sentence orders (76%) versus 65 and 67% respectively for men.
• A report by NEF has found that for every £1 invested in support-focused alternatives to prison, £14 worth of social value is generated to women and their children, victims and society over ten years.

 Women on remand

• Women on remand make up 16% of the female prison population.
• Women on remand spend an average of four to six weeks in prison.
• 56% of women remanded into prison do not go on to receive a custodial sentence.
• In the twelve months leading up to March 2013, 3,631 women entered prison on remand awaiting trial.

Indeterminate sentences for Public Protection (IPP)

• In June 2012 there were 131 women in prison serving IPP sentences.
• Nearly 80% of IPP sentences for women were for offences of arson, which is often an indicator of serious mental illness or self-harm.

Foreign national women

• Foreign nationals make up 15% of the women’s prison population.
• 46% of foreign national women in prison are serving a custodial sentence for drug offences, compared to 21% of women of British nationality. Women imprisoned for drugs importation are largely from Nigeria, Jamaica and South Africa.
• 16% of foreign national women imprisoned are there for fraud and forgery offences (usually possession of false documents).
• Some foreign national women in prison are known to have been coerced or traficked into offending.

Prison Research

Bad Girls, Within These Walls, Prisoner Cell Block H… prisons provide vivid material for writers of TV drama because the lives of so many prisoners have been filled with trauma and abuse before they get to prison. A prison setting offers an enclosed world where the audience can get to know the characters and where the constant efforts of prisoners to get one over on the staff give opportunities for comedy even when the main storyline is tragic.

Bad Girls has set out since its first series to raise awareness of what happens in women's prisons and to highlight the issues women in prison face. Those involved in its production have gone to great lengths to try to make it as accurate as possible, but it is a drama series and life in prison is not always so exciting, so it would not be fair to think that everything Bad Girls shows us actually happens on a regular basis. So what is life like beyond G wing at Larkhall?

There are 18 prisons in England and Wales which hold women prisoners. Not all are women's prisons - some hold women and men, but they do not have contact with one another. Three of the women's prisons are 'open' prisons. Only women who are not regarded as a threat to public safety or a real escape risk are sent to the open prisons where security is less stringent and women are often able to work outside the prison. There is one women's prison in Scotland. Only six of the women's prisons take women who are waiting on remand - days, weeks or months - to be dealt with at court.
Women's prisons vary from Victorian style prison wings like Larkhall to modern cabin-style accommodation. Two of the open prisons have been converted from old country houses, with some added wings and buildings.
There are plans to open two new prisons for women, which will provide an extra 810 places

In the first week of June 2002, there were 3,764 adult women and 619 girls under the age of 21 including children as young as 15 in prison - a total of 4383 women.
They make up about just over 6% of the total prison population. Between 1993 and 2000 the average population of women in prison rose by 115%, as against 42% for men.
The number of women in prison is now at an all-time high. Some of the reasons for the massive increase include:

• An increase in the number of women appearing before the courts
• An increase in the proportion of women receiving prison sentences
• An increase in the length of prison sentences imposed on women
• An increase in the number of women who commit drug offences which attract heavy penalties
• Inequalities in sentencing options and limited community penalties (such as community punishment orders or offending behaviour programmes run by the probation service) for women in some parts of the country
• A lack of co-ordination in the criminal justice system in regard to women, and a failure, until recently, to prioritise reducing offending by women.

Women on remand, waiting to be dealt with at court, make up a fifth of the female prison population, but women are less likely to be remanded in custody than men. They are held for an average of 36 days, but the period varies from a few days to months.
Two out of three women held in prison on remand (before their trial or sentence) do not receive a prison sentence when they go to court - they are either found not guilty or given a community sentence. Community sentences include community punishment orders, where offenders have to do unpaid community service work, fines, community rehabilitation orders, where offenders have to have regular contact with a probation officer and may attend a special course to help them stop offending, or electronic tagging.

Although women are generally treated a little more leniently than men by the courts, some women seem to be given particularly harsh sentences.
The top seven offences for which women were sentenced to prison in 2000 were, in order of frequency:

1. Theft from shops
2. Wounding
3. Fraud
4. Production, supply or possession with intent to supply a class A controlled drug (such as heroin, cocaine, crack or ecstasy)
5. Motoring offences
6. Burglary
7. Handling stolen goods

Most women in prison are serving short sentences for non-violent offences.
Among the population of sentenced female offenders, the main offence groups in 2000 were drug offences (over a third of women prisoners), theft and handling (one in five) and violence against the person (16%).

Women lifers represent only 3% of the total lifer population which was 4540 in 2000. Just over 80% of female lifers have been convicted of murder. The remainder have been convicted of manslaughter, attempted homicide, other violent offences and arson. Lifers are only released after they have served their tariff (the amount of time the judge and the Home Secretary agree is necessary as punishment for the offence) and then been assessed as safe for release by the Parole Board. Some lifers spend many years in prison after their tariff is served because the Parole Board believes they still pose too much of a threat to public safety. Once released lifers are supervised for years by the Probation Service and they can be recalled to prison if their behaviour gives cause for concern at any time for the rest of their lives.

Girls under 21 years of age are held in special units in adult prisons. At present 10 prisons house female young offenders. In 2000 there was an average of about 200 young women under 21 in prison on any given day.

The backgrounds of many women in prison are predictably bleak - just as they are shown on Bad Girls:

• Over 25% have, like Denny, spent time in public care
• 20% of women in prisons have spent time as an in-patient at a psychiatric hospital
• 47% have no educational qualifications - like the Julies and most of the other inmates of G wing
• Over half the women in prison report that they have suffered violence at home and 1/3 have experienced sexual abuse (this is likely to be an underestimate as sexual and domestic violence is under reported)
• Half the women in prison report that they were, like Buki, dependent on drugs in the year before they came into prison
• Nearly 40% have alcohol problems
• Mental health problems are another major issue:
• 75% of women in prison have a neurotic disorder, such as depression, anxiety or phobias
• Women prisoners have a high rate of severe mental illness such as schizophrenia or delusional disorders
• Half of the women in prison are on prescribed medication such as anti-depressants or anti-psychotic medicine

For many mental health problems are an issue before they come into prison, but for some, like Roisin, the experience of separation from children and loss of liberty can be enough to cause mental health problems to develop.
In mid-2000, ethnic minority groups made up 25% of the female prison population.
A high proportion of the prisoners from ethnic minorities (15% of all female prisoners in 2000) are foreign nationals, most of whom are held for drug offences. Many of the foreign national prisoners have been arrested at ports or airports as they try to enter the country with drugs. These drug 'mules' are often unaware how seriously the offence they are committing is taken in the UK and believe they will simply be sent home if they are caught. In some cases they are women facing extreme poverty or urgent need, such as medical treatment for a child, in their countries of origin and get involved in drug smuggling because there seems to be no alternative. They face long prison sentences and are usually deported at their release date.

More than half of all women in prison have a child under 16 who was living with them before they were sent to prison. Over one third of mothers in prison have a child under 5. Four prisons have mother and baby units providing a total of 64 places for mothers and their young babies. It is estimated that over 8000 children are affected each year by their mother's imprisonment.

Women are held an average of 63 miles away from home, though as always this average figure conceals very wide differences with some women being held over 100 miles from their families. The distance and the fact that some of the prisons are very difficult to get to by public transport mean that maintaining contact is far from easy. The children of women in prison are often cared for by grandparents or friends of their mother rather than their fathers and this too sometimes means they are unlikely to be brought to visit on a regular basis.

G wing at Larkhall is not an easy place to be. Prisoners have to work out who to trust, who they should avoid and who not to cross. They need to develop relationships with staff which help them to get what they need, but have to be careful about getting too friendly or they risk being seen as a grass. Staff have to develop relationships with prisoners which enable them to help with resettlement and maintain security, but they have to avoid getting too personally involved like Di Barker, stereotyping all prisoners like Sylvia Hollamby or abusing their position like Jim Fenner. All these dilemmas face prisoners and prison staff in prisons throughout the country.
What makes women's prisons such tense and difficult places is not only what happens inside the prison, but all that is going on in women's lives outside both before and during their time in prison. Most men with families who are sent to prison can expect their female partners to look after the children, pay the rent or mortgage and bills and visit while they are in prison. Most women cannot rely on partners to look after all these things. Many are single parents and they stand to lose their accommodation as well as their children while they are in custody.
Obviously women who have committed crime need to be dealt with by the criminal justice system, and it would be unfair if they were treated very differently from men. The rapid increase in the women's prison population is a real cause for concern though. Locking up women has effects far beyond the prison gates because women still play such a major role as carers for children and elderly and disabled relatives. There are also so many women in prison for whom it is clearly not the right place - such as women suffering from serious mental health problems, or those waiting on remand who will not be sent to prison when the court has heard their case.

Rehearsal Diary

Characterisation

Shell Dockley

Sentence
Life imprisonment for the kidnap, torture and eventual murder of the woman who 'stole' her boyfriend.

Background
The daughter of an alcoholic mother - Rita - and an abusive father. Shell was sexually assaulted by both of her parents when she was younger which my be a reason that she is so reliant on the attention she gets from Jim Fenner. Shell also has Two daughters, Kayley and Dena, who lived with her mother before being taken into care after Shell was forced to remember her horrific past.

Profile

On first appearances, Shell is the archetypal prison bully. Her ambition is to be queen of the landings and she needs all the little status symbols that life in a prison can offer. Although she would never admit it, she yearns for the respect and the admiration of her fellow inmates. She is, however, constantly undermined and her attempts at bullying are rarely successful. Very often, she finds herself alone and isolated, without any real friends.

Shell has many talents, but perhaps her greatest skill is lying. It makes her a dangerous prisoner because she is always so convincing. She can think on the spot, unlike many of the prison officers who have to deal with her. Shell's not all bad, but some of her jailers would disagree. She also has a quick wit and an incredibly sharp tongue.

I have watched both the musical and the TV show of Bad girls and have decided that I would most like to base my version of Shell Dockley on the TV series. I have decided to do this because I feel that she is more realistic. Shell in the TV series is a lot more feminine and psychologically messed up whereas the portrayal of Shell by Nicole Faraday, in the musical, is a lot more bulshy, angry and violent. I like the idea that Shell is more of a psycho than a violent murderer as I think it gives her more depth and reason and makes her a little bit easier to understand and more interesting to watch.

Production Roles

Props List – Bad Girls

Bag of clothes for Rachel

Towel

File (Helen)

Bowls/Plates/Cups/Trays/Cutlery

Chocolate Bar (Hollamby)

Sock with pool balls (Denny)

Fake Cigarettes

Hanky/Tissues (Fenner)

Photo (Rachel)

Drug Packet (Shell x2)

Necklace (Rachel)

Magazine (Hollamby)

Coffee Cups/ Kettle etc.

Notebook (Jim)

Mop and Bucket (Julies)

Letter (Helen)

Rubber Gloves (Julies)

Mops/Brooms (Prisoners)

Bible (Crystal)

Drug Tray

Biscuits (Biscuit Trolley)

Bag of Clothes (Yvonne)

Flick Knife (Yvonne)

Bottles of alcohol & Cigarettes (Yvonne)

Hip Flask (Yvonne)

Bag of possessions/Books etc (Nikki)

Keys (Prison Officers x5)

Umbrella (Justin)

Poem (Rachel)

Radio (Hollamby)

“something” from Rachels Cell (Fenner)

Mobile (Number 1)

Note (Justin to Julie S)

Breath Freshner (Number 1)

Paperwork/Files (Helen)

Red Folder (Helen)

Bag and coat (Helen)

Bottle of Vodka (Justin)

Glasses (Helen)

Food for the servery (Shell and Denny)

Sugar Jar (Servery)

More Drugs (Shell)

Keys (Noreen)

Cables (Nikki and Justin)

Parcel (Justin)

Camera (Noreen)

Drugs & Straw (Shell)

Pee Pot (Jim)

Handcuffs (Jim)

Lighter (Shell)

Watch (Yvonne)

Stanislavsky

Augusto Boal