RE: THE ZAHID MUBAREK INQUIRY WITNESS STATEMENT OF PAUL HENNEY

RE: THE ZAHID MUBAREK INQUIRY

WITNESS STATEMENT OF PAUL HENNEY

I, Paul Henney says as follows:

1. I am a learning mentor currently employed at Chesterfield High School, Crosby,
Merseyside. Between 1997 and 2001 I was employed by the Prison Service at HM
Prison Altcourse. I have been asked to provide a Witness Statement to the public
inquiry into the death of Zahid Mubarek. I make this statement from facts and
information within my own knowledge that I believe to be true. I have been asked in
preparing this Witness Statement to give evidence on identified areas which I will
refer to during the course of this my Witness Statement.

2. In 1997 I began working as a Prison Custody Officer at HM Prison Altcourse. Prior to
my employment at HM Prison Altcourse I had been a self employed roofing
contractor. In 19991 changed from being a Prison Custody Officer to working in the
prison gym as an Activities Development Officer. In 2001 I left HM Prison Altcourse
and moved to Chesterfield High Scl_ool as a learning mentor where I am currently
employed.

3. There is now shown to me marked (WB 414-415) a Witness Statement which I
provided to the police on 9 August 2000. This statement relates to an incident which
took place at HM Prison Altcourse involving Robert Stewart on 28 November 1999. I
confirm that the statement I gave to the police is complete and accurate and there is
nothing further regarding this incident that I would add to the statement.

4. I have been asked to comment directly upon how much contact I had with Robert
Stewart while he was at HM Prison Altcourse and the context in which that contact

occurred. At the time of my contact with Robert Stewart I worked on the induction

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wing. This wing had 72 inmates at any one time and each shift had two officers
working on the wing. Further the inmates at HM Prison Altcourse were unlocked for
13 hours a day so there was a lot of contact between myself and the inmates of
which Robert Stewart was one. During the day inmates at HM Prison Altcourse
would attend classes for education but the rest of the time we kept them occupied on
the wing carrying out chores such as cleaning. I would say that in these
circumstances even though I was not Robert Stewart's personal officer I had a lot of
contact with him. I would say that the context of my contact with Robert Stewart was
in the day to day running and management of.the wing.

5. I have beerier)be my general impressions of Robert Stewart. I would

say that he, from what I can recall, was a quiet person who kept himself to himself. I

believe he was a Mancunian and from what I can recall he had a Manchester accent.

At HM Prison Altcourse the majority of our inmates were from Liverpool and therefore
because Robert Stewart was from Manchester and had a Mancunian accent he

received verbal teasing from other inmates. As a result he was quiet and kept
himself to himself. I do not recall having any major problems with Robert Stewart
other than the incident giving rise to my Statement to the police.

6. Robert Stewart stood out because he was tall, thin and gangly. He also had a
closely shaven head from what I can recall, although this was not unusual as most of
the inmates kept their hair cut short because of infrequent visits from the prison
barber. He also had what I recalled was a tattoo of a swastika on his forehead
although I have since seen pictures of Robert Stewart which show this tattoo to be a
cross with two dots. However, as I have said above, he mainly stood out because of
his accent which was out of place with the other inmates who were mainly from
Liverpool. His behaviour did not make him stand out. I would describe him as a
loner.

7. For all the time I had contact with Robert Stewart he never showed any racist
behaviour. I did during my time as a Prison Officer come across inmates who were
racist and showed racist behaviour but Robert Stewart was not one of them. That

being said, given the location of HM Prison Altcourse there were few inmates who
were from ethnic minority backgrounds, we had some but not many.

8. Robert Stewart never came across as suffering from a mental disorder. I was never
informed that he may have been a psychopath or was suffering from a personality

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disorder. I would say that in respect of my dealings with him Robert Stewart was not
out of the ordinary. Indeed, I was very surprised to hear what had happened to Zahid
Mubarek as, compared to some of the people I dealt with at HM Prison Altcourse, the
murder of a fellow inmate did not seem to be in Robert Stewart's makeup. I never
saw him being aggressive other than the one incident when I provided a statement to
the police and on that particular instance I believe he was led on by somebody else.

9. In the statement I gave to the police (WB 414-415) I stated that I had read Robert
Stewart's file and knew he had assaulted officers and members of staff in other
prisoners. This remains my recollection although I have since been informed that
Robert Stewart's prison files contain no such entry. When an inmate came to the
prison as a new inmate they were issued with a core file. When they were
transferred from another prison then their core file would accompany them. Each
prisoner also had a history sheet which was kept on the wing, the F2052A. In this
particular instance I recall that there was a message written in the handover book
when Robert Stewart first came on to the wing which advised officers to read Robert
Stewart's file before unlocking him. The file that I read would have been Robert
Stewart's F2052A history sheet. As I believed he had a history of assaulting prison
officers and members of staff you did not want to simply unlock Robert Stewart's cell
door without being on your guard that he may attack you. This note would have been
written by my manager who could have either been Gary Macellan, Gary Richardson
or Jim Farrell. As I have said we would have been told about Robert Stewart
especially as he had a history of assaulting staff.

10. However every time a new inmate came on the wing, we were supposed to read his
core file to bring us up to speed with each new inmate. I worked on the induction
wing and the population of the wing was transient with a large flow of inmates in and
out. Inmates would stay on the induction wing for approximately 5 days to allow
them to complete their induction process. Further, HM Prison Altcourse was only a
remand prison so once prisoners were sentenced they were moved elsewhere. We
also had a handover book in the wing office in which you wrote anything important
that had happened that day. This was for the people on the next shift to read, the
handover was also known as the Occurrence Book. As mentioned, each individual
inmate also had their own file to which we could add entries. The core file of each
inmate was reviewed weekly by the Wing Manager with the inmate and together they
went through their behaviour for the week.

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11. HM Prison Altcourse was a private prison and therefore procedures were different to
other prisons. For example, prisoners were not locked up for as long as they are in
other institutions and they had up to 13 hours out of their cells. I believe there was
better compliance with the rules of HM Prison Altcourse because we could always
threaten inmates with sending them to other institutions which had harsher regimes.

Signed ..........................................

Dated .... •.......................................

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