Rusty is being Barlinnied

News is coming out of Barlinnie that Timothy Rustige is suffering badly in the holocaustic atmosphere in Barlinnie Prison in Glasgow.  I have just had an e-mail from a friend of Rusty who tells me that he has run out of paper and cannot get anything but scraps off prison staff.  I append below the e-mail she sent me below.  All readers try to do something to alleviate Rusty’s difficulties.  He is not a criminal, he is a prisoner of conscience, a political prisoner and certainly not a man to be treated in this way. 

HERE IS THE EMAIL 

I expect you will both have heard from Rusty.  I am feeling really anxious about him, re blood pressure, possibility of a second stroke.  There is no excuse for the way he is being treated.  It would be wrong even if he had committed a crime.

 

I received four letters this morning, written between 23^rd and 26^th May, and, just in case you don’t know this already, he asks for the following information to be put on line on your websites:-

 

Firstly, many thanks to everyone who has been writing to him, the support is a real life-line (though a ‘grumpy prison officer’ has been complaining about the amount of mail he’s receiving!).

 

Next, he’s run out of A4 lined writing paper, and can only get piddling little pages at Barlinnie.  He says he’d really appreciate a refill pad from eg Pound-stretchers, also A4 envelopes.  All he has to do all day is write, so he needs plenty of both.  No need for biros or stamps, he can buy those.

 

He’s been asking ever since he arrived to get books from the prison library, with no result.  (Sheer wanton cruelty, I would call that.)

 

His blood pressure is now causing him a lot of worry, and medical attention is ‘a joke  –  these people aren’t interested in their prisoners’ medical problems  –  they see any complaints a some sort of potential dodge.  Thus my past stroke history, blood pressure being sky-high and my forearm melanoma problems (too many years working in the tropical sun) they have no interest in.  Serve them right if I keel over with a heart attack and die on them.  But considering the self-harm/violent attacks on other prisoners/suicide and murder record this place has, my death would simply be marked down as yet another ‘insignificant incident’. 

 

The levels of self-harm and suicide at Barlinnie are sky-high, he says, and would be worse if most of the prisoners weren’t drugged up to the eyeballs or rendered moronic by watching television.

 

Re television: he has been moved to a different cell, because his cell-mate is being punished with a week’s telly deprivation, but they are too kind-hearted to expect him to do without it (though not kind-hearted enough to allow him any books).  His address is now (best to write it out in full, though only the cell number has changed):

 

HMP Barlinnie,

Tim Rustige  –  134031,

‘A’ Hall  –  3/40,

81 Lee Avenue,

GLASGOW,  G33  2QX

 

He has had no visitors since being transferred to Barlinnie, as he himself has first to apply for each individual to be admitted and, as yet, does not know anyone to name as a prospective visitor.  Is there anyone in Glasgow who would get in touch with him, so that he can apply to the authorities for permission for them to visit ?

 

He is suffering from an ‘information vacuum’.

 

 

Some extracts from letters:

 

‘Yes, 23 hours, some days 24, locked in cell  –  just out to descend three floors of steps with a tray and bowl and get lunch and dinner, then back up  –  locked in cell and eat there, and wash bowl (soup/custard) in washbasin.  No sanitary/hygienic Fairy Liquid or sponge or scrubpad.  Just fingers and warm water, and dry on shower towel.  Dinner plates are issued with meals and collected straight after meals (plastic plates/plastic cutlery)  …

 

‘Yep  –  my early tag-release paperwork processing is now all on hold/suspended.  So all  have to focus on is my August 11th half sentence release date  –  which is a further source of depression on top of ‘shit’ conditions and food here.  Little wonder my old blood pressure complaint is playing up again  –  but qualified/trusted medical treatment here is a joke, so suffer in stoic silence.  Stubborn pensioner!  Such is life for cyber-harassment (alleged) criminals who are labelled by an IP address for paying the phone bill!?  –  and acting in the public interest.

 

‘One day here is a week’s equivalent to life in HMP Grampian.  Little wonder the violence/frustrations/self-harm/suicide rates are sky high  –  a fact you won’t find published in the public-interest media  …

 

‘The 23 (often 24) hours a day lock-ins, plus showers every other day, razors and scissors on request  …  same as phone calls  …  same as library (been here 13 days and requested library every day so far, without result) all has a less than positive effect on the body, soul and psyche.  Then throw in the cold to warm pigswill food factor, and depression is a constant to deal with.

 

‘As far as I am concerned, HMP Barlinnie administration are delinquent in their duty of care and violation of basic human rights.’

 

And again:

 

‘The way my blood pressure is playing up this past few days  –  stress, crap diet  –  then I’ll have a dizzy spell turn into another stroke and exit Barlinnie in a body-bag.  Which would doubtless suit our Scottish government and judiciary antagonists, as then at least one exposé campaigner would be the less to deal with and silence.’

 

WHAT  CAN  BE  DONE  TO  HELP  RUSTY ?

 

He’s made a few suggestions:-

 

‘How to move matters forward ?  I dunno.  Protest to Scottish prison service/HMP Barlinnie management and inquire on the details of my early-release paperwork processing  –  the ‘home detention curfew’ release, as it is known.  That paperwork was started at HMP Grampian on the 13^th May, just prior to the riot and transfer to here.

 

‘Play on the ’65-year-old pensioner’ and ‘political prisoner of conscience’ factors  –  locking investigative journalists and satirical bloggers in prison for exposing government corruption and covering up vile paedophile-ring crimes.

 

‘Maybe the Scottish Prison Service will get the message  –  as my release (tag/early) criterion lies with them and not the police or Crown Office.

 

‘The only factor that might delay/slow down the tag release paperwork processing is that as an ‘England’ resident the ‘community assessment’ side of the tag-release paperwork has to go to our local ‘Trafford’ (Greater Manchester) probation service, and they then contact Ren to verify I/we own our home and I am welcome to return there (how Kafkaesque).  Then, once they report back to the SPS here with a ‘positive’ response, the release paperwork moves into the final stages.

 

‘Further plans that might be tendered are:

 

1        to e-mail (or write) to the HMP Grampian management a request for information/news on when visits to ‘Ellon Block’ prisoners will be resumed.  Specifically, when will the prisoners of Ellon 2-A Hall who were not involved in the destructive riot, and whose hall and cells were undamaged be transferred back to HMP Grampian, to facilitate visits from Aberdeen and Peterhead friends and family.  That might generate some accurate information in response.

2        Saturate-bomb the entire prison system with questions and inquiries, focussing on the factor ‘he was not a common or garden criminal but a ‘political prisoner’ whose fate and well-being and early release are a public-interest issue of primary importance to supporters around the UK and globally.

 

‘So, anything goes, either individually or collectively.’

 

These are people besides the prison authorities that he suggests it may be worth contacting:

 

All MSPs at Holyrood and MPs at Westminster (see their respective government websites for addresses) especially: Hugh Henry MSP (Labour); Ken Mackintosh MSP (Labour); Mary Scanlon MSP (Conservative); Alison McInnes MSP (Lib Dem); Frank Roy MP (Labour); David Burrows MP (Conservative); Priti Patel (Conservative)

 

Roseanna Cunningham MSP (Minister for Community Safety and Legal Affairs)

 

John Carr, Children’s Charities Coalition on Internet Safety (contact e-mail on their website)

 

DI Neal Burton: contact via Scotland Yard/Met’s website address (he is the guy who collared Timothy Storey for online grooming, and is assigned to the kiddie porn squad)

 

Detective Superintendent Dave Gray is the head of operation Yew Tree and already on board.

 

I would certainly keep hammering away at Rusty’s own MP, Graham Brady, who needs to be swamped in letters, e-mails and phone calls.  I refuse to believe these MPs can do nothing to help their extraordinarly renditioned constituents.

 

Also, I’d suggest having a go at the new Chief Constable of Cheshire, Simon Byrne, due to take office some time in June, but at present at the Met.  He’s already been contacted re the Cheshire forces eagerness to hand Robert and Rusty over to Grampian Police/Police Scotland.

 

Must go  –  I want to write to Rusty before the post goes, and also ring the prison, as suggested.

 

All the best,

 

Gillian

So please everybody do your best and get Rusty out of that hell hole.  He is a 65 year old pensioner in a place not fit for pigs.