Gavin Medd-Hall
Gavin Medd-Hall (A3624AD)
HMP Coldingley, Shaftesbury Road, Bisley, Woking, Surrey GU24 9EX
In January 2009 Gavin was sentenced to 8 years in relation to charges in connection with HLS campaigns. (One of the UK SHAC 7)
Birthday: 20th March
What you can send: stamps (12 in letter); Self-addressed envelopes, cheques/postal orders made out to ‘HMP Headquarters’ with Gavin’s name and number and sender’s details on reverse. (Please remember that Gavin has poor eyesight and will appreciate if you write in clear, large writing).
Letter from Gavin, 13th November 2009
Dear All,
Life continues to go very well here, and amazingly fast too – of course I still miss my beloved Jan terribly, but we shall be reunited soon enough.
Sadly there are no tales of daring roof top protests or the like to recount this time, the lags are behaving themselves – well, sort of! Coldingley is very similar in appearance to a South London Council Estate where I come from. Croydon is surrounded by such estates, so it is all very familiar looking, though I don’t believe any of them have a free gym and food give-away!
For those of you following my ‘glittering’ literary career – okay it’s only AS level but better than my grade 4 CSE at school! I have now read Oscar Wilde’s ‘A woman of no importance’. More difficult to read a play than a novel as it contains just speech, no description. It would have been better if we could have gone to see the play, but there was a concern that we might do a runner, as if! Anyway, my second essay is now in and we are embarking on poetry now. It will be interesting; as I’m sure I managed to successfully miss any poetry at school!
For those of you interested in how prisons run, ‘stumble along’ would be more accurate. Here is a typical example of arbitrary rule changes, which occur regularly with no forethought given to the consequences. Up until recently, we have been able to have books handed in on visits but of course it would be easier for all concerned to order direct from say ‘Amazon,’ and have it delivered directly but that would mean using a logical and sensible approach! Anyway this procedure was, without notice or reason, stopped; so one has to put in an application to find out how one obtains books. The answer comes back that the Library and Education Department will now order books to be paid for by lags so one contacts both of these departments. Of course this is the first time they have heard about it and in any case it is simply not possible for them to do this, so we either wait for them to sort it out between themselves or add to the Legal Aid budget by instructing solicitors to jolly the whole thing along.
I am sure it is not yet government policy to ban books in prison, though in fairness I do have to congratulate security for having some fashion sense. They have successfully intercepted a pair of cords destined for Gregg. The reason given was that they were too black looking, the label said ‘Navy‘ but I think it was because they were cords!‘ Well done all concerned.
Now we are in the run up to Christmas (no shopping or stalls for me, excellent!). It reminds me of last year and happy days spent in the pubs of Winchester (surely you mean paying careful attention to court proceedings? Ed.).
A Christmas fayre had been set up by the cathedral complete with ice skating rink for those brave enough. One bunch of fearless skaters was our very own C.P.S. who took the Cops out for a skate (a video nasty on YouTube if ever there was one) sadly, no sprains or broken limbs were reported. (Surely you mean thankfully? Ed.).
The CPS were jolly good like that, they even took the judge to lunch. I wouldn’t have minded but I was never even asked! Of course I wouldn’t have gone, not wanting to waste the public purse further, but it would have been nice to have had the opportunity to say “NO”.
I’m still making excellent use of the gym facilities. Normally, after a few months, I get bored with the gym, but here there are not the usual distractions, so I just keep on going! Jan says it has taken years off me, can’t be bad, I’ll be a teenager when I get out!
I’ve just been told I can go ahead and order a ’talking alarm clock’ from the R.N.I.B. Just goes to show security aren’t all bad, they did stop the infamous “Greggy cords” coming in, too!
On that happy note I’ll say bye for now, and wish you all a very merry Christmas!!
All the best, Gavin
Letter from Gavin, 17th August 2009
Dear All
So how are things going I hear you ask? Remarkably well I would say! Of course I miss my beloved partner, Jan, whom I now get to see most weeks as I have been recently enhanced, which gives me 4 visiting orders a month, which is fab!
For those of you who don’t know me, I am registered blind though I have usable sight. I read/write with the aid of magnifying glasses, so if you do fancy dropping me a line, print or type (large font, thanks!)
Most of my spare time at the moment is taken up with study for an English Lit. course (Victorian Lit.) The book we are currently studying is Jane Eyre (if only I had watched any of those TV adaptations that always seemed to be on a Sunday eve!). The Education Department have supplied me with a large print version of the book. As it’s in 16pt easy read font, it comes in 3 separate volumes of about 450 pages each! So reading all that (several times) and doing a 5000 word essay on why Rochester did/didn’t do something or other, you can see I am kept busy!
If you would like to lose weight I can definitely recommend prison as the best way! I always used to go to the gym, but there was always a pub next door. Well I had to re-hydrate, didn’t I? I came into prison with 40-inch waist jeans. My new pair, kindly supplied by Jan via a property exchange, are a 36-inch waist and even they are loose. So when they say ‘Prison works’, they are referring to getting fit, absolutely nothing else!
It can be very sleepy down here in Surrey, so much so that a few weeks ago a couple of the lads decided to have a rooftop protest (no one knows what about). The roof was only about 10 ft high, so not a proper one, but enough to stir it up! They were in such a rush to liven things up, they left their mobiles behind so no live Sky News interviews for them! The wimps only lasted 4 hours before they climbed down a ladder provided for them! So we all had an extra afternoon locked up. Excellent. Cup of coffee, and listened to Test Match Special, what better, well, yes, England winning would be a start!
Time really does fly in here, cannot believe I’m in the 8th month already. I’ve found a charity that supplies audio books which is great, apart from when they send you a book you have already had!
When we first arrived the food was somewhat basic: frozen veg and pasta mainly, but with the willingness of the catering manager to improve the quality of the food, and with the help of the VPSG, it has to be said that the food now is really excellent! Well, that is unless he goes on holiday and the kitchen returns to type. But on the whole it is now very yummy!
I miss Jan terribly, otherwise life in my temporary Surrey studio is good: free gym, excellent food (mostly) and some education too! Now all I need is for Spurs to win the league! (Hmm, more chance Jack Straw will pardon me!)
Best wishes to all
Gavin