As detailed within the probation pages, under the prison section, visits are
a minefield of bureaucratic red tape and over estimated security concerns.
This is
compounded by the furious and vicious problems associated with the feud between
so called normal prisoners and the VP prisoners.
Vulnerable prisoners, which of course includes sex offenders, from rapists to
flashers who have caused so much media attention, prisoners who have "grassed
up" other inmates and in so doing broken the prisoners code, some lifers
who have been inside for thirty years and older prisoners.
Normal prisoners, which of course includes burglars who have devastated old
peoples lives, drug dealers who have devastated children's lives, by now you
will have noted that to me, they are all just the same! But not in prison, for
some reason the normal prisoner has a need to feel socially expectable.
Into this, you have to carefully put families, sitting down three visitors and an inmate around a low coffee table. The prison is only able to separate the two different groups by using two sets of tables, each end of the visitor hall, but on weekends this "no mans land" is non-existent.
The only deterrent is the threat of visits being stopped for combatants.
The prison has a visitors entrance or separate building with all the information and advice, it usually has a small area of seats and refreshments.
When the
visits start the visitors are processed through the search system, to make sure
the 9mm pistols, files and drugs are taken off little old ladies.
The system has a very long list of kit you cannot bring in, however anything
you are bringing in has to have been excepted in writing first. When you bring
it in it is checked and handed to the prisoner after you leave, sometimes this
is more than a day later.
You can only take small change into the visitors hall, that is to buy light refreshments with, for you and the prisoner. No other items are allowed to be taken in, the prisoner is even not allowed to keep his watch on, in case he swaps it for an expensive one and then trades it for drugs.
As you can see, both sides in this tableau are as paranoid as each other. The whole issue revolves around preventing anything being brought into the prison, by visitors. A pity then that all prison officers and all staff are not made to strip completely and change clothes, as you do in chemical factories, that would take out the other possible route of ingress!
The visit of your family can be very uplifting because you can be "normal" for a little time. I found the environment too painful for my children to come into, however very small children would probably be ok.
Some prisons are introducing a passport system, whereby the visitor has a passport issued to speed up the process, however like most things to do with visits, it is purely another deterrent to visiting. The cost of policing visits and the associated problems that it brings, is one of the main headaches to the prison governors.
Click on the site below for a more detailed article.
If you are receiving benefits or are on a low income, you may be eligible to claim the cost of travel to prison visits from the Assisted Prison Visits Unit (APVU).
http://home.btclick.com/pffs/apvu.htm