Thirty years ago, I stood cheering outside the Old Bailey as Gerry Conlon of the Guildford Four walked free from court.
It felt like a Hollywood moment. Minutes earlier, the four had been cleared of their wrongful conviction for the Guildford and Woolwich pub bombings. After 15 years, justice had finally been done.
Flanked by his triumphant sisters, Gerry punched the air, his head held high, his wide eyes steely with the pulse of vindication and his shoulder-length hair flowing in the autumn breeze. He then delivered a perfect statement to the media while us campaigners cried with joy and disbelief.
“To this day, exonerated prisoners do not receive the assistance they need to acclimatise and return to normal life after they are released.”
I was 16 years old, and it was the best day of my life. I hoped it was the best day in Gerry’s life, too – or at least the start of a happier existence for him.
Sadly, the Hollywood moment only cast him into a new horror film.
Besieged by demons from his brutal interrogation and years in prison, and tossed aside by the same system that had previously flung him into jail, Gerry struggled. Big time.
He felt enormous guilt over the fate of his father, who had travelled to London from Belfast to help his son mount a legal defence, only to be wrongly arrested himself and die in jail.
At one stage, Gerry blew £120,000 in just six weeks, most of it on crack cocaine. He took drugs to stay awake, because when he fell asleep the nightmares would begin and he would awaken knotted in drenched sheets, screaming: “Get off me, stop beating me!”
For a while, he hid in a tiny flat in Devon. Then he lived off food scavenged from bins. In 2014 he was diagnosed with cancer. He died three weeks later.
The other three have faced their own traumas. Paddy Armstrong remembers the day it all came at him after his release. “Suddenly it’s like I’m propelled from my chair and I’m kicking the wall,” he wrote in his memoir. “Screaming at the top of my lungs. ‘The bastards! The f**king bastards!’ I don’t know how long I cry and kick.”
Paul Hill’s daughter died earlier this year from a suspected overdose. The other member of the Guildford Four, Carole Richardson, died of cancer aged 55.
Although the four received compensation, none of them were given emotional or practical support from the state. Nothing has changed: to this day, exonerated prisoners do not receive the assistance they need to acclimatise and return to normal life after they are released.
“What’s the point of releasing the wrongly convicted prisoners? Why does society consider their appeals and let them go when they’ve been vindicated?”
A small scheme run by Citizens Advice for exonerated prisoners reported that one third of its clients became homeless after they were cleared by the court of appeal.
In 2013, the government’s merciless austerity programme turned its wicked gaze to these traumatised and very vulnerable people. Compensation for the wrongly convicted is now restricted to those who can demonstrate “beyond reasonable doubt” that they did not commit the offence.
This is a much stricter burden of proof to that needed in the court of appeal. The Guildford Four would not have qualified for a penny under these rules.
Indeed, by 2017, not a penny was being paid to exonerated prisoners. After wrongly convicting people and stealing years of their lives, the system would just dump them on the street to fend for themselves.
Victor Nealon spent 17 years behind bars before his conviction for rape was overturned in 2013 after DNA evidence proved another man was responsible.
Nealon was released with only three hours’ notice. He was handed £46 and a train ticket to Shrewsbury. He couldn’t even find himself anywhere to stay on his first night of freedom.
And he was not only denied compensation. The Ministry of Justice demanded he paid £2,500 in costs after he tried to challenge that refusal. His experience is mirrored by that of many other framed prisoners.
The irony of the current arrangements is that more post-release support and rehabilitation is offered to those who are guilty, because probation and resettlement services are not accessible to those who have been released after a successful appeal.
But prisoners who were falsely accused need more support, not less. The transition from wrongful incarceration to rightful release should be handled compassionately — they should be offered specialist psychiatric care, housing and automatic compensation to help them back on their feet.
In the wake of his release from jail, Gerry Conlon was showered with attention. Supporters queued up to shake his hand. He was given a book deal. A film, starring Daniel Day-Lewis, was made of his story. But, compensation aside, the state offered him nothing.
In 2005, Tony Blair apologised to the Guildford Four on behalf of the government. But what use was this to anyone but Blair and the vanity of the British state? Perhaps those watching on the news got to feel good about living in a progressive society. But it was of no use to Conlon as he scavenged for food in bins.
What’s the point of releasing the wrongly convicted prisoners? Why does society consider their appeals and let them go when they’ve been vindicated?
If it’s through any sense of fairness, morality and justice, don’t you think the system should stay true to these principles even after the cameras have stopped clicking and the public moment has passed?
Any one of us could be falsely accused. Would you expect to be tossed out onto the streets after 15 years, or would you expect some help back onto your feet? Isn’t that the least they could do?
Chas Newkey-Burden is a writer and author.