Book review: Suicide in Prisons: Prisoners’ Lives Matter
| Date | 01 September 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0264550517724040 |
| Author | Eleanor Fellowes |
| Published date | 01 September 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
Book reviews
Book reviews
Suicide in Prisons: Prisoners’ Lives Matter
Graham J Towl and David A Crighton
Waterside Press; 2017; pp. 205; £22.50; pbk
ISBN: 9781909976443
Reviewed by: Eleanor Fellowes, KUF Lead (London, South & Wales)
Institute of Mental Health
The increase in suicides is surely the worst consequence of the recent deterioration
in safety in prisons, confirmed by the latest statistics (Ministry of Justice, 2017).
Given the context, this book makes for difficult and necessary reading. Graham
Towl and David Crighton provide a comprehensive overview of most that is known
about suicide in prison, balancing pragmatic analysis with a humane appeal for this
issue to be given the attention and resources it deserves and needs. They temper
their outrage with a scrupulous attention to detail, making their final statement all the
more powerful:
Suicide prevention is, above all, about people. It is about the values that people hold. It is
fundamentally about accepting and acting on the basis that prisoners’ lives matter. (p. 177)
Their criticism is not focused on prison staff, but on governmental decisions that
have cut resources, demonstrating all too literally that prisoners’ lives are not worth
what they should be. And the ripple effect of this political neglect is a prison system
that does not make training around suicide obligatory for staff, emblematic of
skewed priorities with real and avoidable consequences.
The chapters range from the theoretical (how suicide is understood) to the data-
driven (the statistics around suicide, and what they tell us) and the practical (how
suicide is and should be managed in custody). All of these are relevant, and it is the
way they speak to each other that lends the text its weight. The interface of theories
with data is always presented with a view to what they tell us about what needs to be
further understood, or done; this is a practical book that contains real and grounded
guidance and direction for the prison service and the politicians who resource it.
Probation Journal
2017, Vol. 64(3) 301–308
ªThe Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0264550517724040
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The Journal of Community and Criminal Justice
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