1990 Strangeways Prison Riot - Background

Background

Manchester's Strangeways Prison, which opened in 1868, was a "local prison" designed to hold prisoners from the surrounding area, mainly those on remand or serving sentences of less than five years. At the time of the riot, the main prison consisted of six wings connected by a central rotunda known as the Centre. Convicted adult prisoners were held in wings A, B, C and D, and convicted young offenders were held in E wing, which was physically separated from the Centre by gates. Convicted prisoners on Rule 43(a) were held on landings C1 and C2 of C wing, and remand prisoners on Rule 43(a) were held on the fourth landing on E wing. F wing contained administrative offices on the lower floor and the chapel on the upper floor. Remand prisoners were held in wings G, H, I and K of a separate prison, linked to the main prison through workshops and a kitchen. The Certified Normal Accommodation Figure for Strangeways, the number of prisoners the prison was designed to hold, was 970. The population of the prison had increased in the months before the riot, from 1,417 in January 1990 to a peak of 1,658 on 27 March. On 1 April, the prison contained 1,647 prisoners – about 925 convicted adult prisoners, 500 remand prisoners and 210 convicted young offenders.

Prisoners felt their complaints about conditions were being ignored. Remand prisoners were only allowed out of their cells for 18 hours per week, and Category A prisoners were locked in their cells for 22 hours a day, and rarely left their cells except for "slopping out", a one-hour exercise period each day or a weekly shower. In March 1990, Dominic Noonan was transferred from Strangeways to HM Prison Hull. Noonan was the organiser of the Prisoners' League Association (PLA), an organisation formed in 1989 which campaigned for prisoners' rights. Its aims included initiating legal proceedings against prison staff for mistreatment of prisoners, and picketing outside prisons in which prisoners were mistreated. The PLA were active at Strangeways Prison, and Noonan's transfer demonstrates prison officers were aware of rising tensions inside the prison. On 26 March, Barry Morton was taken to the "punishment block" and strip-searched after being visited by his mother, as prison officers believed she had brought drugs into the prison for him. During a struggle he sustained a black eye and swollen nose, and the following day he was released back into the main prison along with another prisoner, Tony Bush. Later the same day, Bush and Morton climbed onto the roof of the prison and staged a twenty-hour rooftop protest. On 31 March there was a 30-minute sit-down protest in the chapel after a film was shown, which ended after a prison officer promised to listen to the prisoners' grievances. The same evening it is reported that a black prisoner was assaulted by prison officers in front of other prisoners, and injected with Largactil – a sedative used to control prisoners, known in prisons as the "liquid cosh". Prisoners then decided to stage a further protest in the chapel the following day, 1 April.