Dr Ben Cave is one of the UK’s leading forensic psychiatrists. He has 35 years of experience, including as a prison psychiatrist and a consultant in secure and general mental health units. He is also the author of What We Fear Most. We discuss misconceptions around mental illness, the fact the Mental Health Act does not apply in prison, and the risk of being a forensic psychiatrist where Dr Cave had a security system linked to the police installed in his home.

Buy a copy of Dr Cave's book, What We Fear Most, here.

Subscribe to monthly bonus episodes of Evolving Prisons for £3 per month here.

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

Jason worked as a prison officer in both mainstream and sex offender prisons. He tells us about the mental health toll the job takes, whereby three of his colleagues took their own lives. He also talks about how management seeing prison officers as a number can contribute to them feeling undervalued and lacking self-worth, and he shares personal experiences he had of this during his time as an officer.

Subscribe to monthly bonus episodes of Evolving Prisons for £3 per month here.

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

This is a 10-minute teaser of my full conversation with Oscar Castro, released as this month's bonus episode. Subscribe here for £3 ($3.85) to listen to the full conversation and all monthly bonus episodes.

Oscar Castro was on his third trip to Latin America to smuggle heroin back to America when he was caught at a hotel in Ecuador. He subsequently served 7 years in prison there. What's it like to spend time in a prison where you have to buy your cell and can get access to almost anything, as long as you pay the guards enough money? Is this still punishment? And how does Oscar feel for his part in contributing to the devastating impact drugs have?

Oscar Castro's links

YouTube: @globalockdownoscarcastro

Instagram: @globallockdown

TikTok: @globalockdown

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

Jamie Morgan Kane spent 34 years in prison in America after walking into his home and finding a deceased man there who his wife had poisoned. Jamie was taken from the UK to America illegally as a baby and he shares how it felt re-adjusting to life in the UK at age 64, when he was deported after release from prison, despite spending almost all of his life overseas. He also tells us how it felt to do things he loved again, after being unable to do them for 34 years during his prison sentence.

Subscribe to monthly bonus episodes of Evolving Prisons for £3 per month here.

You can connect with Jamie here and see his incredible creations and artwork.

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

Recently, the BBC aired a documentary about Andrew Malkinson, an individual from England who was wrongfully convicted of rape and spent 17 years in prison, until he was released in December 2020. Danny Barrs is the Chair of Promoting Prisoners Maintaining Innocence. Danny chats about majority verdicts in jury cases, how it can be difficult for innocent people to progress through prison and the difficulty they can face in obtaining compensation from the state upon their release from prison.

Learn more about the BBC documentary here or watch it on BBC iPlayer.

Subscribe to monthly bonus episodes of Evolving Prisons for £3 per month here.

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

This is a 20-minute teaser of my full conversation with Cage and Andreea, released as this month's bonus episode. Subscribe here for $3.85 (£3) to listen to the full conversation and all monthly bonus episodes.

Cage is currently serving a 50 year prison sentence in Texas for aggravated robbery while his wife, Andreea, lives in London. They met in 2020 when Andreea wrote to Cage through writeaprisoner.com. They talk about how their relationship developed and how they maintain it despite the obvious barriers, the stigma attached to meeting and marrying someone in prison and their plans for the future, despite Cage only being 12 years into his sentence.

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

Chelsea Cameron wrote an open letter to her drug-addicted parents in 2017, thanking them for teaching her that life isn't all sunshine and rainbows. She shares the letter with us and tells us about the stigma of growing up with drug-addicted parents, whether prison helped her dad, and the issue with drugs in Scottish prisons, where 1 in 10 prisoners say they had never touched drugs before their imprisonment but started using them while inside.

Subscribe to monthly bonus episodes of Evolving Prisons for £3 per month here.

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie

William Noguera spent 40 years on death row at San Quentin Prison for a murder he committed at age 18. Last year he was taken off death row but he is still in prison. He chats to us from his prison cell, telling us how a day on death row looked, how it felt to be given an execution date, how he feels about potentially being released one day into a society he hasn't been in for 41 years and how he has stayed disciplined to write books, host podcasts and create art while on death row.

Subscribe to monthly bonus episodes of Evolving Prisons for £3 per month here.

William's links

Website

Podcast

YouTube

Evolving Prisons links

Website: evolvingprisons.com

Instagram: @evolvingprisons

LinkedIn: kaigancarrie