Humans Of Our Prisons

22/03/2025

Kia ora, Beth here, co-founder and main contributer of this project. You may have noticed it's been quiet a few years... I'm now living overseas so can't do any further interviews with NZ prisoners/prison communities. I tried to hand it over when I left, but it seems as though it hasn't continued. I'm back for a visit and would be interested to chat to anyone who might be (seriously) interested to continue it, and/or to host the 'read more' stories on an appropriate existing website. Please private message me if you have the skills, time and vision to do this. Cheers.

08/01/2022

Mark’s story (3/3): When I was in jail, I wrote my first poem. It took me about three minutes, ok maybe five. And I passed it around the East Wing – which is five year sentences and over. You know – serious criminals. Me, I was only doing three years. It’s kinda deepish, so I handed it around the wing. There was Islanders, there was Asians, there was everybody in there and they all had a cry. And that’s when I thought, man, I might have a skill here.

I don’t write to process my emotions, no, it’s the result of my thoughts and collecting my emotions. It’s the result of that. The reason I started smoking dope, when I was a little kid, was to slow my mind down. I used to freak my old man out, and my old lady, by saying “I was thinking about this when I was sleeping last night” – ‘cause I was – you know, give me a problem and literally I’ll go to sleep on it and I wake up in the morning, and I would have had a cognitive thought about the issue. It’s like a meditation, I guess.

These are actually quite good, some of these poems. I can write other than just jail s**t. I haven’t published anything yet, but that’s my goal.

Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/marks-story/

07/01/2022

Mark’s story (2/3): I stopped drug-dealing. I stopped drug-dealing for one reason and one reason only. I wanted *tap tap tap to mean that somebody was at my door to see me, you know.

First couple of years, you could have sat in my lounge, not a single tap, tap, tap. And this is from 10 pound a week, having people lining up down the street, up my drive, to my door. Lining up... to no-one! It made it real for me; made life real for me; made relationships real for me. You know, like I consider I brought myself up. And I didn’t know how to teach myself discernment. The sincerity of a person. If you came up to me, “oh, I love you” – well, I’d believe it. ‘Cause face value is all I had to go by. So if people say ‘you can trust me’, well, I would. It was face-value, it’s all I’ve got. So that’s one action that taught me a whole lot about people. Even after my psychology course. It sort of, you know how sometimes you can sit in the classroom and you can be taught something, but it’s just head-knowledge.

You can’t learn anything, you can’t teach anybody anything. But they are free to learn from you. And there’s a huge difference. It’s like children, eh, we’re busily trying to teach them right from wrong, while we’re busily doing something else. And guess what it is they pick up? The doing. No matter what you say, it’s the doing that they pick up instinctively. And sometimes, you sit in that classroom, and you’re getting given knowledge. And yeah, I understand that. I get that. I get that. And then, a week, a year, 10 years later, I GET that.

Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/marks-story/

06/01/2022

Mark’s story (1/3): Depression took 2-3 years, off and on. And sometimes I still get a bit lonely and stuff. But I know how to combat that stuff. You just go for a bike ride. Honestly, the sunshine is the best cure. It’s some chemical that’s released, it’s a happiness drug, apparently.

Anyway, so, got through all that, got a job at Kelvin’s Furniture*, and then I got busted driving one of my workmate’s vehicles, so I gave him $400 to get his car out and then quit my job. Because they were good enough to give me a job, I’d never really had a proper job. I mean, I have, but not really one where my heart was in it. And this is probably the scummiest, lowest on the rank job I’ve ever had, but I LOVE it. I love it. I have a passion for it. It’s really important.

So because they’d done that for me by getting me a job, when I got busted driving I knew I had to quit, because I knew how the system works and sometimes it disappoints you greatly. They’ll write your name in the paper and then they’ll go ‘employee of…’ or ‘works at…’ and I thought, I don’t want to soil these people. That name, connected with my bulls**t. So I left. And that was about a year ago.

And then just some weeks ago, I rung up, and the guy goes, ‘’It’s Kelvin’s Furniture*, Kelvin* speaking’. And I went, “g-day Kelvin* speaking, it’s Mark here. Any work?” And he goes, “I’ll see you Monday, mate. Good to have you back.”

The only reason I went back is ‘cause of something he said. ‘cause I said to my boss, “I might have to go to jail here,” and he goes - and this is what got me, being an old orphan streetkid nobody, - he goes, “well, when it’s all over, you make sure you come home”.

Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/marks-story/

*Names have been changed

15/12/2021

Jarrod’s story - I think there's a misconception that prisons are somehow easy, that they’re somehow a hotel. I defy anyone who goes to prison to say that it's easy. The isolation, the fear, always needing to look over your shoulder. You may say that some people have a better imprisonment than everyday life, but that just says something about the everyday life in certain
communities.

You don't see gangs forming in suburbs like the boring, middle class suburb I grew up in. They form in areas where social and economic deprivation is at its highest, and they join for a sense of family, particularly when their families have been inadequate or abusive. I’ve spent a lot of time getting to know gangs, because New Zealand doesn’t have much research on them, even though we write quite intrusive legislation about them. My book about the history of gangs is called, “Patched”...

Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our.../jarrods-story/

13/12/2021

Grant's story - That night, I sat in my room and looked around. I had two pictures on my wall, some clothes on the floor. I had this s**tty old Duchess thing, and I had a double bed. And up until about 6 months before that, I’d had a Mark III Zephyr, a V8 Falcon, a BSA motorbike, and a houseload of furniture. And basically, it just all went up my arm. So I remember sitting on the edge of my bed, thinking - I can’t do this anymore. I am so over this s**t life. And su***de came into my head. And then my mum came into my head. Because you know, she’d already lost two boys. And her husband, (even though they were already separated by the time he died). So she’d lost two sons, and I thought - I can’t do this to my mum. Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/grants-story/

30/11/2021

David & Lorraine’s story 2/2 - The first time we turned up at the Men’s prison, goodness gracious the young lad had forgotten to put our names down, and he wasn’t going to let Dave though, even though we had our IDs and everything. And last week, they wanted to take David out of his chair, because it was going to set the machines off... Then another guy came along and said, “I’ll take care of you guys.” It was the absolute opposite, it just depends on who’s there. We work in the s*x offender’s unit. It’s a compulsory program, so it’s in their best interests to behave well. It means the staff can be a bit more relaxed with them, which is really lovely to see. There’s one guy in there, he’s only young... 21 and he’s already done 3 years. So he was just a kid when he went in, only 17 or 18. And he doesn’t know how to deal with his emotions, as with most 21 year old boys. He’s still got another year to serve. He really needs a lot of encouragement. S*x offenders are all lumped together under that umbrella term. A s*x offender and a pe*****le to us are poles apart, but to society, they’re all considered disgusting - the scum of the earth. So their transition into the community is shocking, because nobody wants them. Others can do their time and it’s over, but not them. One man we’re dealing with, his whole family absolutely... wiped him. So he’s dealing with that as well. Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/david-and-lorraine-mentors/

22/11/2021

David & Lorraine’s story 1/2
David: We met in hospital, after my accident. Lorraine nursed me in the Spinal unit. Neither of us were ever going to marry again, but you know… famous last words! We’re both pastors and work as a team, and we go into the prisons as mentors every weekend. We feel a bit like a mum and dad figure, which is an area many of them have struggled with. Lorraine: They can see David’s also in a prison, not of his choice, but he’s got such a lovely demeanour, and it speaks volumes. We take hope to them. Even though they’re in prison, they’ll be out someday and even in prison, you can choose a good attitude. A lot of people have fear about ex-prisoners, maybe because they don’t know what exactly their crime was and maybe because if they’re big, or have tattoos, they can appear intimidating. But they’re still people, they’re not animals. There are some who act like animals because they’ve been treated like animals. One guy we found out had been locked in a kennel at his home. That just makes me want to cry. How else do you expect them to behave normally? And the staff aren’t trained to look after people with psychological traumas. They’re criminals, but shutting them up and treating them like animals doesn’t fix that. Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/david-and-lorraine-mentors/

22/11/2021

We have a new home! The Humans of our Prisons full stories can now be found here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/ Pathway is an inspirational organisation in Christchurch, with a genuinely caring team of people, who do incredible work with folks inside prison and those reintegrating on release. Definitely check out their website to find more of the many areas they're involved in. They've kindly agreed to host the Humans of our Prisons full stories as a tab on their website, so enjoy browsing!

Pathway Trust is a charitable Trust giving people an opportunity at a fresh start. Our employment program, accommodation, affordable housing and prison reintegration programs help give people a fresh start.

22/11/2021

Henare’s story - People look at courtrooms with all the brown faces and think it's just the norm for them but it's not! I felt the shame, standing before the judge, your family in tears and me thinking, “what's gonna happen now?” I think a lot of Māori people go through that phase of feeling ashamed of the culture. The media paints a bias and selectively focuses on the negative things. That's a stigma that needs to go. Let's be clear that being Māori is not a factor in making wrong choices. Remember that 92% of Māori will never go into the criminal justice system, but that 8% makes up 51% of the current prison population. And our prisons are very much based on a Western model of judicial system. If I were King, I’d start with putting in place 50/50 partnerships of Māori/Pākehā in everything including parliament. That’s the way it was supposed to be. And would those partnerships like each other? Hell, no! But it’s good. If you’ve got 50/50 partnerships, no one can dictate what the choice is going to be. Everybody needs to learn to work together. It's about Māori succeeding as Māori in a Māori way. And for others it’s ok if Māori succeed as Māori in a very Pākehā way. The purpose is for Māori to succeed. Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/henares-story/

08/11/2021

Nigel’s story 2/2 - I was on bloodspill job in prison. It was quite good, actually, because you get around the whole prison, and you get to see the damage first-hand. It’s like Chinese whispers, by the time the story gets around the prison, it’s different people, different outcome. So when we came back after cleanup, everyone was waiting for the real story. The prison was in Northern Territory Australia, and for some men in there, that was the first time they’d had running water, electricity, and 3 meals a day. In the wet season we knew there’d be an influx soon, to get a dry bed and clean clothes. Prison’s easy, but it’s a waste of life. I was classed as a 501, and imprisoned in Darwin, then was escorted by guards to Perth. The detention centre is an hour out of Perth, so the family would have had to fly over there, hire a car, accommodation and all the rest of it just to pop in for a visit. So we didn’t worry about that. All you have in prison is a pen, so when filling out appeal papers, you’ve got no resources. They ask for your licence numbers and all, so I just had to write, ‘unable to complete.’ When I went to prison, because of my charges, I was put in as High Risk. Took me a while to earn my downgrade to Medium Risk, and I was sitting on Medium for 2 years. They said because of my charges, and immigration, I can’t get to Low. If I was Australian I could move forward, but being from New Zealand I couldn’t. I realised each prison has their own rules they follow, which are not necessarily backed up by law. One call from a lawyer and I was downgraded to Low, and could move into a Low security area. I’ve got no prison history, and didn’t cause any riot-ups or anything. I did all my programs, and counselling and rehab. So I earned my release and was waiting to be told I could return to my country. Then they packed us up and took us to Christmas Island! 4,000km further from my destination. Being low security, I wasn’t cuffed, but as soon as my foot hit the tarmac on Christmas Island, Serco guards said, ‘’You’re now on Christmas Island, you’re now High Risk.’’ I didn’t know what the hell was going on. I’ve figured out it looks better for Australian Immigration if I’m High risk, they can pat themselves on the back, saying, ‘’yes! We’ve now got rid of another high-risk 501.’’ After release I was deported back to NZ. It was easy to find a job. I’m a tradesman, and good at my job. I went back to someone I’d worked with before moving to Australia, and told him I’d been inside. He said, ‘’right, you over it?’’ I said ‘’yeah.’’ He said, ‘’right, we’ll carry on, then.’’ With my accommodation, I specifically played the whole interview thing away from - why did you leave Australia? I have no desire to get on drugs again. With drugs, you’ve got to want to try to give up, or want to get on it. I regret that I lost time with my kids… my son was 5 when I went in, and we went camping every Christmas, so I’ve let him down for 3 years. I’ve got some making up to do there. And my girls, of course, but they’re a bit older. I’ve got a lot of making up to do with my son. Read the full story here: https://www.pathway.org.nz/humans-of-our-prisons/