‘But despite your brother’s unusual skill,’ I point out, ‘if, as you suggest, sixty per cent of inmates are on drugs, you’ll need more than the odd prisoner who’s willing to swallow a packet of heroin to satisfy the demand.’
‘True,’ said William, ‘so stay alert during visits, Jeffrey, and you’ll notice how much transferring of drugs is done by kissing. And whenever you see a baby dangling on its mother’s knee, you can be sure the little offspring’s nappy will be full of drugs. That’s how the visitor gets it into prison. The kissing is how it’s transferred from visitor to inmate. And there are still a dozen or more ways of getting the gear in, depending on which prison you’re sent to. If you ever spot someone coming into jail wearing an Adidas tracksuit, look carefully at the three stripes. If you unstitch just one of them, you can fill it with five hundred pounds’ worth of heroin.’
My only thought is that I have an Adidas tracksuit in my cell.
‘My brother Michael,’ continues William, ‘discovered that in some prisons Waterstone’s have the book franchise, so a friend of his would select an obscure title, fill the spine with drugs, and then ask Waterstone’s to donate the book to the prison library. Once it had been placed on the shelf, Michael would take it out. Amazing how much heroin you can get into the spine of James Joyce’s Ulysses. But in my last nick,’ William continues, ‘the Sun’s page-three girl was the most popular method of getting the skag in, until the screws caught on.’
‘The page-three girl?’
‘You do know what a page-three girl is, don’t you, Jeffrey?’ I nod. ‘Most A- and B-cat prisons allow an inmate to order a morning paper from the local newsagent,’ continues William, ‘and because you’re locked up for twenty-two hours a day, they even deliver them to your cell. One enterprising dealer “on the out” supplied the entire prison’s needs, by sprinkling any orders all over the page-three girl in the Sun. He would then cut out another copy of the same photograph and seal it carefully over her twin, making a thin bag of heroin. He ended up supplying a grand’s worth of heroin a day to one prison, with an officer unwittingly delivering his wares to the customer direct. He was making far more with his built-in customers than he could ever hope to make “on the out”.’
‘But how did he get paid?’
‘Oh, Jeffrey, you’re so green. On every spur, on every block, in every prison, you’ll find a dealer who has a supplier on the outside and he’ll know your needs within hours of your being locked up.’
‘But that doesn’t answer my question.’
‘You make an order with your spur dealer,’ continues William, ‘say a gram of heroin a day. He then tells you the name and address of his supplier, and you select someone “on the out” to handle the payments. No standing orders, you understand, just cash. In your case you could have your supply delivered under the Scarfe cartoon in the Sunday Times.’ I laugh. ‘Or under the stamps on one of those large brown envelopes you receive every day. You’d be surprised how much cocaine you can deposit under four postage stamps. You watch the screws when the post arrives in the morning. They always run a thumb over the stamps, but you can get a lot more in via the envelope.’
‘But they always slit the envelopes open and look inside.’
‘I didn’t say inside,’ said William. ‘You may have noticed that down the right-hand side of most brown envelopes there’s a flap, which, if you lift carefully, you can fill with heroin and then seal back down again. I know a man who has Motor Magazine sent in every week, but it’s under the flap of the brown envelope that he’s getting his weekly fix.’
‘As soon as the buzzer goes, I’m going to have to run back to my cell and write all this down,’ I tell him.
‘How do you write your books?’ William enquires.
‘With a felt-tip pen.’
‘Lift the cap off the bottom and you can get about fifty pounds’ worth of crack cocaine stuffed in there, which is why the screws make you buy any writing implements direct from the canteen.’
‘Keep going,’ I say, having long ago given up sealing any plastic bags, but somehow William manages to do that job for me as well.
‘The most outrageous transfer I’ve ever seen was a twenty-seven-stone con who hid the drugs under the folds of his skin, because he knew no officer would want to check.’
‘But they must have machines to do the checking for them?’
‘Yes, they do, in fact vast sums have been spent on the most sophisticated machinery, but they only identify razor blades, guns, knives, even ammunition, but not organic substances. For that, they have to rely on dogs, and a nappy full of urine will put even the keenest bloodhound off the scent.’
‘So visits are the most common way of bringing in drugs?’
‘Yes, but don’t assume that lawyers, priests or prison officers are above being carriers, because when they turn up for legal and religious visits, or in the case of officers, for work, they are rarely searched. In some cases lawyers are paid their fees from drugs delivered to their clients. And when it comes to letters, if they’re legal documents, the envelope has to be opened in front of you, and the screws are not allowed to read the contents. And while you’re standing in front of a screw, he’s less likely to check under the stamps or the side flaps. By the way, there’s a legal shop in Fleet Street that is innocently supplying envelopes with the words LEGAL DOCUMENT, Strictly Private and Confidential printed on the top left-hand corner. Several drug dealers have a monthly supply of such envelopes, and the only time they ever see a court is when they are standing in the dock.’
‘You also mentioned priests?’
‘Yes, I knew a Sikh giani [priest] at Gartree who used to give his blessing once a week in a prisoner’s cell from where he supplied the entire Sikh community with drugs.’
‘How did he manage that?’
‘They were secreted in his turban. Did you know that a turban can be eighteen feet of material? You can tuck an awful lot of drugs in there.’ William pauses. ‘Though in his case, one of his flock grassed on him, and he ended up doing a seven-year bird.’
‘And prison officers?’
‘Screws are paid around three hundred pounds a week, and can pick up another thirteen pounds an hour overtime. Think about it. A half-dozen joeys of heroin and they can double their wages. I knew a member of the kitchen staff at my last prison who brought the stuff in once a week in his backpack.’
‘But he would have been liable to a random search at any time?’
‘True,’ William replied, ‘and they did regularly search his backpack, but not the shoulder straps.’
‘But if they get caught?’
‘They end up on the other side of the bars for a long stretch. We’ve got a couple in here right now, but they’ll shift them out to D-cats before it becomes common knowledge.’ He pauses. ‘For their own safety. But the championship,’ says William, like any good storyteller holding the best until last, ‘goes to Harry, the amateur referee from Devon.’ By now, William has a captive audience, as all the workers on our table have stopped depositing their wares into little plastic bags as they hang on his every word. ‘Harry,’ continues William, ‘used to visit his local prison once a week to referee a football match. His contact was the goalkeeper, and at the end of each game, both men would return to the changing room, take off their boots and put on trainers. They would then leave carrying the other person’s boots. There was enough heroin packed into the referee’s hollow studs for him to buy a country cottage after only a couple of seasons. And remember, every match has to be played at home. There are no away fixtures for prisoners. However, the silly man got greedy and started filling up the football as well. He’s currently serving a ten-year sentence in Bristol.’