I Just Wanted to Be Loved: A boy eager to please. The man who destroyed his childhood. The love that overcame it.. Stuart Howarth

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       Chapter Five

       RELEASE FROM STRANGEWAYS

      On the morning of 19 September 2001, I was wakened at 7 a.m. by a prison guard banging on the cell door with a heavy wooden truncheon. It's a harsh noise that startles even the heaviest sleepers. I boiled the kettle for a quick brew, knowing that I would just have time to gulp it down and get dressed before the screw came back for me.

      I took a last look round my cell, which was 18 feet long by 8 feet wide, with mottled, yellowing concrete walls and a single barred window. The bunk beds on which thousands of other men had slept before me had filthy, torn bedding. There was a rickety table, a chair, and the only other piece of furniture was a small chipboard cupboard in which I kept the few items of clothing allowed. I'd shed many tears in that cell and in some ways it had become my home over the last few months.

      Those who have walked similar paths will know about the knot you get in your stomach and the fear that hits you like a steam train when you contemplate the prospect of release. Is this really it or is someone going to say at the last minute that they've made a mistake and you're not getting out after all? Will they find some trumped-up excuse to delay things, as they had so many times before? I had a lump in my throat as I was led off the wing and downstairs to the prison reception area, carting my belongings in black bin bags like a down-and-out. I was shown into a windowless room known as ‘the sauna’ because of its soaring temperature. Long benches were already lined with fellow inmates from other wings of the prison.

      Every morning prisoners who are either due in court or due to be released are brought there for holding at 7.30 a.m. It's the prison's last chance to take away your dignity and remind you that you are ‘scum’. Most people were silent that morning, just focusing their minds on what lay ahead, but some of those who were leaving were discussing where they would score their next hit of ‘brown’ (heroin).

      Heroin has become the most popular prison drug because it can be flushed out of your system within twenty-four to forty-eight hours if you drink enough water. In addition to this it can be masked by other opiate drugs whereas cannabis, for example, stays in the system for thirty days and will be detected by the piss-test screws.

      I hadn't wanted to take drugs in prison because I'd seen how it made you dependent on the dealers; they could make you do all sort of things you didn't want to do just by withholding your next fix. But a lot of guys turned to it because they just couldn't cope with the fear inside. I know of at least fifty men who had never taken a drug in their lives before but became addicts in prison. It's easier to get drugs inside jails than it is out on the street and, given the understaffing, it is often simplest for guards to let the lads do drugs because it makes for a quieter wing.

      I was bringing a claim against the prison for ill treatment at the hands of some of the guards, in particular the way in which my strip searches were carried out, and it hadn't made me very popular, to say the least. As I sat in the ‘sauna’ that morning, I wondered if there might be one last attempt to get back at me. My stomach was churning with anxiety and I felt sick. I could see the finishing post in sight and could smell freedom but was still not sure what would happen next. When you go into prison, there are no welcome packs or induction meetings; you are expected to know everything already or just pick it up as you go along, which all increases your sky-high anxiety levels.

      I was also scared of what I would find in the outside world. How would people respond when they met me? Would they see me as a cold-blooded, dangerous killer? Would I be judged on that one brief moment for the rest of my life? How could things ever be normal again? Would people understand or would they write me off as being ‘bad, naughty and no good’, as my stepfather always had?

      Sitting in that sweaty room, eyes to the floor, waiting and waiting interminably, brought on an intense flashback: I was a very young boy again, crouched naked in my room with my arms wrapped round me, waiting for something unspeakable to happen. No one could help me. I was utterly powerless and had no choice but to do exactly as I was told. It made me feel small and vulnerable and terribly alone. I shivered, despite the heat of the room.

      In prison that morning the echoes from my childhood were especially strong because of the way I'd been exposing the terrible demons deep inside my head to the psychiatrists who investigated my case and then to Neil Fox. They insisted that I had to tell them everything, which was very, very difficult, and then they simply left me with no aftercare whatsoever. In my experience, prison is not a place for rehabilitation; it's a ‘lock up, lock down’ process where you do your time and are then released.

      The door of the sauna room kept opening and closing and each time I looked up hopefully only to hear the screw shout someone else's name. I didn't have a watch but I sensed that it was at least a couple of hours later when the door finally opened and I heard my name – ‘Howarth!’ I stood up and walked across to the door. ‘Strip search,’ the guard said, and I steeled myself to get through it one last time.

      For someone who has been sexually abused, having to stand naked and bend over in front of prison guards is an unbearable violation. In Strangeways, I'd sometimes been strip searched as many as eight times a day. Every time I felt I was a small child being abused by my dad again.

      ‘Have you been shaking your willy after you've been for a wee?’ Dad used to ask. ‘Have you got stains in your underpants?’ I'd squirm with embarrassment at his scrutiny, terrified that I might have left a mark on my pants when I went to the toilet outdoors. If I had, punishment would follow.

      There was nothing I could do but comply with the guards, keeping my eyes to the floor, trying to pretend I was somewhere else – anywhere but in that room.

      Next there was the form-filling to be done.

      ‘Just sign there,’ said a big guard. ‘We'll see you when you come back, Howarth.'

      ‘You won't be seeing me again,’ I vowed.

      ‘Yeah, that's what they all say,’ he sneered. ‘You'll be back, you'll definitely be back.’