Clients often ask me to to undertake Prison Visits. There are approximately 90,000 prisoners in the UK. This is enough people to fill Wembley Stadium.
Reasons for Prison Visits
Often the visit will be to present court or legal papers to a person serving a custodial sentence. They may be on remand awaiting a court hearing and this may also be linked to the matter about which I am instructed. Often requests for visits to serve papers are initiated due to the impending release of the prisoner. There may be a need to prevent the prisoner upon his release pursuing a course of action that would result in their speedy return to prison. On some occasions, the matter may relate to a claim the prisoner is making against another person or organisation. Here there will be paperwork to complete, review and sign. Once I had an instruction where the prisoner was claiming against The Prison Service. They had issued a razor and the prisoner claimed that using it had caused personal injury. He sought to claim compensation!
The Process during Prison Visits
Process servers have to request a legal visit before they can enter the prison. After that, visits are usually quite simple. Sometimes the Prison Service cannot locate a prisoner and this is a little worrying! A few prisons seem harder to get into than out. We usually complete instructions however with little fuss, in spite of this. Prison staff will always do their best to ensure that the process runs smoothly. Prisoners usually seem pleased to see a new face and rarely complain about their life inside. This maybe says as much about their life outside of prison as it does about life on the inside.
Whilst jail does result in the loss of liberty, fortunately, however, access to legal assistance and advice still remains intact for all of those prisoners who need it.