THE PRISON

Bang Kwang Central Prison

Most foreigners in Thailand’s prisons are incarcerated for drug offences. Drug offences are considered the most serious criminal offences in Thailand. It is not uncommon for those caught with drugs to receive life sentences or even the death penalty. Bang Kwang Prison houses those inmates serving sentences of 25 years or more.

The conditions inside Bang Kwang would be considered harsh by any Western standard. Bang Kwang Prison, known by the Thais as ‘The Big Tiger’ for its ability to eat men alive, houses about 5000 men, including several hundred foreigners in an eighty-acre compound of buildings. Each cell in Bang Kwang houses between ten and forty men who sleep shoulder-to-shoulder on their bed mats, which are five feet long. Death row inmates are housed up to 100 men per cell.

“You literally cannot lie flat on your back put your hands on your stomach if you do that your elbows are on two other beds. That is pretty damn close and that is fifteen hours a day.” (British inmate, quoted in BBC documentary.)

Each room has a fan and barred windows that let in the hot, humid air, as well as the monsoon rain during four months of the year. Fluorescent bulbs burn twenty-four-hours a day. Sewers are open drains that run through the prison, uncovered, untreated. Going to the toilet is a public exercise. Besides the stench and health risk they pose during the hot dry months, the sewers regularly overflow and flood the prison for weeks during the monsoon season.

Due to the overcrowding and lack of sanitation, diarrhea, skin rashes and other illnesses are so common as to be unremarkable, while tuberculosis and other serious diseases are dangerously common. Access to medical care is extremely limited, and the prison doctor provides only paracetemol (Tylenol) for illness.

Food rations are a bowl of dirty rice a day and perhaps fishhead or cabbage soup. Anything else must be purchased by the prisoner. Thai prisoners are regularly visited by family and friends, who bring food, supplies such as soap, clothing and toiletries and deposit money into the prisoners’ account to ensure the prisoner can purchase drinking water, food, and other necessities from the prison store. Those who do not have access to money from the outside are required to sell their labour to other inmates or to guards, in order to buy food. Prostitution is one means of survival. There is a great disparity between prisoners who get support from the outside, and those who don’t.

“Nobody help me. Nobody help me. Sometimes, I’m sorry, when you go to the toilet at night, come back you don’t have a space to sleep. And food, is not enough at all. And everything you should buy yourself!” (Afghan inmate, quoted in BBC documentary.)

The prisoners are unlocked and let into the compound from 7:00 – 16:00 each day and locked in their crowded cells the during remaining fifteen hours. Outside, they wander around a compound with open sewers, garbage and evidence of insanity everywhere. Here, they pass the hours cooking rice or food purchased from guards on make-shift burners. There is no pretense at attempting to rehabilitate inmates, nor at providing inmates the means to pass the time. They are not provided sports equipment, exercise equipment, art, crafts, or work programs at Bang Kwang. No library, no education programs, no games, no TV room. Nor writing paper, art material, video games or books. Distractions of any kind must be purchased from the guards, or sent in by relatives or friends, including postage to send mail. Harder than the harsh physical conditions, say the prisoners, is the struggle against boredom, with nothing provided to occupy the inmate’s emotional, physical or spiritual needs during the interminably long hours.

Many of the prisoners cite the lack of any intellectual stimulation as the most difficult aspect of their incarceration, and fight continually against depression, despair and hopelessness. Bang Kwang takes a heavy psychological toll on all the inmates. Thailand’s own studies of prison populations cite very high rates of mental illness (60 – 70%) and suicidality (10%) among inmates. Human Rights organizations, such as Amnesty International, have repeatedly cited Bang Kwang for its severe overcrowding, use of leg restraints, torture, inadequate sanitation and medical care, etc. in violation of international standards of prisoner treatment.

“I see a lot of people who are losing their minds. I see men turn into zombies, literally tuning out and existing in a numb-state. It is a struggle to stay sane here.” (current inmate)