Inside the Texas supermax prison inspiring a revolution in British jails
Convicted murderer Ray Davis admits it took him six years incarcerated in a supermax prison in Texas before he decided to try to turn around his life.
The 51-year-old killer is 30 years into a 99-year jail sentence for murder but has earned himself a chance of parole 15 years early because of his good behaviour and work ethic over the past 24 years.
His success is emblematic of an approach being considered by Shabana Mahmood, the Justice Secretary, for prisons across England and Wales in what could be the biggest shake-up of sentencing in more than 30 years.
Under the initiative at Estelle Supermax Penitentiary in Huntsville, prisoners earn credits of 10 to 30 days a month through good behaviour and engaging in work, education, training and treatment programmes. This 'earned time' is taken off their sentences to bring forward their parole to as early as a quarter of the way through their jail terms.
Without engaging with the 'good behaviour' scheme, Davis says he would not have been eligible for parole until 2040. Through his spotless disciplinary record and prison roles as janitor, engineer and supply worker, he has not only learnt new skills but also earned enough 'credits' to have just had his first parole hearing.
Standing bathed in the bright February afternoon sunshine slanting across a cell corridor, Davis says: 'It took me six years to realise this is not a game, this is my life. I messed it up once, I'm not going to mess it up again.
'I realised you need to do better every day. That's when I got on the road to being a better me and understanding your good time credit does count for some of my time of being in prison.'
The scheme to incentivise good behaviour and rehabilitation was introduced under a $2 billion cross-party project to tackle overcrowding after the Texas prison population rose from 30,000 in the 1980s to more than 150,000 in the early 2000s.
Alongside the introduction of diversionary schemes and alternative punishments to prison, it has contributed to a fall in the jail population to some 135,000. At the same time, re-incarceration rates within three years of prisoners' release have fallen to 16.9 per cent and crime is down by 29 per cent to its lowest level since 1968.
It is why this week Ms Mahmood and David Gauke, the former Tory justice secretary leading her sentencing review, visited Estelle supermax prison 70 miles north of Houston. Without reforms to sentencing, prisons in England and Wales could run out of space in as little as 18 months.
Texas may seem an incongruous exemplar for penal reform given its record of executing some 600 prisoners in the past 40 years, including two already this year – more than any other state. Seven of its 173 people on death row are women.
Ms Mahmood says: 'I'm not here to cast aspersions on bits of their legal system that we would never introduce into ours but there are important things to learn from here. I've come here deliberately because I think they've achieved great success in getting down their crime rates.
'They were in the same position in 2007 that we were in and they've turned things around. Frankly if we could get our rates of re-offending and our recidivism rates down to anywhere close to where they are we would see a huge impact on crime levels. So I'm very comfortable being here and learning lessons from them.'
The philosophy of Estelle is summed up by a mural of a tiger in its entry hall, painted by an inmate with the words: 'One bad chapter doesn't mean your story is over.' Incentivising good behaviour and rehabilitation underpins the four 'prisons' within the 5,500-acre Estelle complex of more than 3,000 inmates.
One is a cell block holding 720 high-security or high-profile criminals. Texas has 12 known gangs, which is why the prison runs a gang renunciation programme for members to voluntarily give up their affiliations in return for support and good behaviour time off their sentences.
They are mentored by Jimmy Delgado, 51, a convicted murderer and former member of the Mexican Mafia gang, who as a young man spent his first 13 years at Estelle in solitary confinement refusing to accept the regime.
He says: 'I watched men's minds snap. I witnessed men break. I decided from that point, I was going to get out of 'seg'. I couldn't see myself being in a 6ft by 9ft box for the rest of my life.'
He is now a devout Christian, a field minister and a life coach with a BSC degree who prepares young 'hard head' prisoners for parole. 'Who better to talk to a hard head than someone who used to be a hard head,' says Delgado, who is up for parole in 2030.
The second prison within a prison is a medical wing providing care to up to 120 inmates and laser tattoo removal to burn off inmates' gang insignia. It is also treating two death row inmates for cancer, though both are expected to die before they are executed.
The main building houses 'general' prisoners and fourth is a specialist unit to treat substance addiction. Anthony Newton, the warden, says: 'Most of our reforms are cognitive intervention and teaching life skills so when they are released, they can be successful and continue to reduce our recidivism rate which is 16.9 per cent,'
The 45-year-old says the good behaviour credits are a 'motivating tool' to 'make inmates work and be productive' rather than having 'idle time to think about doing more crime'. As well as workshops, inmates are employed in the jail's own textile mill which produces their white uniforms, towels and linen.
By working hard five days a week and keeping a clean disciplinary sheet for a year they can earn a place in the 'incentivised living centre' with space for 150 prisoners. Its more liberal regime keeps cell doors open from 7am to 10.30pm and has a 'day room' with big TV screens in which they can freely socialise.
Almost all prisoners get tablets to message their families and download books, educational and religious material. However, the most trusted inmates get add-ons of videos, games and music. Faith is a big theme, with Godfellas, a Christian group, advertising its 'music ministry' on a poster on the day room notice board.
The success of the incentives is reflected in the proportion of inmates on the top tier earning 30 days off their sentence each month, which has risen from 50 per cent to 65 per cent of prisoners.
Estelle has also pioneered a 'cold turkey' unit, known as the Substance Abuse Felony Punishment Facility (SAFPF) where 212 offenders whose crime is driven by drug or alcohol addiction have been 'sentenced' to up to nine months treatment and therapy.
They are issued with a 150-page guide on their regime, from how to make their beds neatly in one of its four dormitories to earning good behaviour credits. A note pinned to the unit's big classroom wall warns: 'No eating, no sleeping, no slouching, no sub-grouping talking. Acknowledge your peers.'
Garrett Simmons, the assistant warden overseeing the unit, says: 'If you're not making your bed, you'll get a disciplinary chit. When it's reviewed, it would be a lesser disciplinary penalty. If you are a habitual offender, then it would upgrade to a more serious offence that can affect your good behaviour credits.'
It is a model of enforcing a treatment regime on addicted criminals which Ms Mahmood believes could be transposed to the UK. 'It's obviously very targeted to people who might in our system be described as prolific offenders,' she says.
'There's clearly a benefit in having a sentencing option that is designed to get them into programmes that are very, very targeted at effectively the hardest to help offenders who've been addicted for a long time.'
Mr Gauke, whose sentencing review is due to be completed this spring, believes the Texas good behaviour model could work in tackling overcrowding and rehabilitation if focused on longer-term prisoners. 'Our prison population has not expanded because we've got lots of people on short sentences, it's because we've got lots of people on long sentences,' he says.
'There is a lot to be said about incentivising people, because particularly if someone is in prison for a longer time, you can take a more considered approach to assessing their behaviour and ensuring that they do the courses that are necessary.
'If you have a system that can do that, you can prepare people for life outside prison, you can reassure the public that prisoners are being released at a point where they provide a much lower risk to the general public. And I think we can start to address some of the challenges in terms of prison capacity.'
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