The Lifeboat News: Re: MPs seeking meeting with Assange are rebuffed by Justice Secretary

Universal suffering

Name supplied - HMP Whatton 31st January 2021

It’s such a pity that District Judge Vanessa Baraitser hasn’t presided over most cases in this country, as she seems to be compassionate about prisoners’ mental health in the USA (Julian Assange has depression and she ruled he cannot be extradited to face trial in America).

There must be hundreds, if not thousands, of prisoners in this country that have mental health problems, including PTSD, chronic depression and Asperger’s Syndrome, who are still locked away in unhygienic, third-world conditions we laughingly call prisons. With each issue of Inside Time there are loads of letters from inmates who have, or are, suffering mentally for reasons such as being an IPP and over tariff, or falsely accused of crimes.

Yet, according to the Honourable Judge, HMP Belmarsh has ‘protective factors’ and, presumably, no mental health issues, self-harm or suicide. I suggest that before becoming a Judge, appointees should spend a week locked away for 23-hours a day in Britain’s ‘modern’ prisons. So that they can ponder what it is like to be serving a never-ending sentence imposed by their colleagues.

https://insidetime.org/universal-suffering/