2. Establishment and Population

REPORT BY HM INSPECTORATE OF PRISONS ON HM PRISON, ABERDEEN 1997

2. ESTABLISHMENT AND POPULATION

Establishment

2.1 HM Prison Aberdeen is situated on the A956 in the Torry district of the City, approximately one mile south of the city centre. Built in 1891, it is bounded on all sides by public roads which precludes the possibility of any lateral extension.

2.2 Also known as Craiginches, the establishment is one of the smaller local prisons in Scotland but is nonetheless a complex one. Its current functions are as follows:-

• To provide reception and holding facilities for young offenders (YOs) and adults (of either sex - see below) who have been remanded in custody by the local courts, including from Orkney and Shetland, and are awaiting trial or sentence.

• To house short term prisoners - ie, those serving sentences of under four years - including fine defaulters.

• Exceptionally to house a small number of long term prisoners (LTPs) outwith normal classification.

• To act as a holding location for Persons Awaiting Deportation (PAD).

• To house up to 10 females from the North of Scotland, which includes those serving sentences of less than two years.

• To provide a Training for Freedom (TFF) Hostel for up to eight prisoners approaching the end of their sentence.

2.3 Until very recently there had been little change to the basic structure of the prison. Laterally, however, a programme to install integral sanitation in both its Halls had been completed and a new gymnasium had been erected, but those improvements were already struggling to keep pace with rapidly changing circumstances. The establishment was 43% overcrowded at the time of inspection and the overcrowding of a comparatively large number of individuals into a very small acreage of ground is in fact an aspect which permeates this entire report - see also paragraph 5.3.

Population

2.4 The establishment is designed to hold 148 in single cell and dormitory accommodation and immediately before our inspection - i.e. Friday 31 October 1997 - the population was 212, accommodated as follows:-

Location	Design Capacity	Population
‘A’ Hall	100	142
‘B’ Hall	30	54
TFF Hostel	8	4
Female Unit	10	12
Total	148	212

2.5 Of that total population of 212, there were 59 on remand of whom 38 were adult males, 18 were males under-21 and three were adult females. Also included in that total were 25 PADs - 17 males and eight females - though by the time our inspection started, those figures had been reduced to eight males and one female. There was also one lodger. A breakdown of the sentences being served by the remainder of the population was:-

Life	-	5
10 years and over	-	3
4 years and less than 10 years	-	18
2 years and less than 4 years	-	25
6 months and less than 2 years	-	52 (including one female)
3 months and less than 6 months	-	18 (including one male YO)
Less than 1 month	-	6 (including two male YOs)
Total	-	127

2.6 All of the remand population were classified as security category ‘B’, whilst a breakdown of adult convicted categories was:-

Category ‘A’	-	NIL
Category ‘B’	-	80
Category ‘C’	-	38
Category ‘D’	-	10
Total	-	128

2.7 In the year prior to our inspection, there had been one escape from Court and three absconds and over that same period there had been one suicide and 17 attempted suicides. There had also been one serious assault on a member of staff and four serious assaults on prisoners by other prisoners. At the time of our inspection, three prisoners were on Intermediate Suicide Supervision, one was on Basic Suicide Supervision and 15 were on medical observation.