Good evening. I'm crouching as we're following a gang of men
who broke into that building.
One of them's a recidivist.
These men have been specially trained. Look at that training!
(Policeman) On the floor! (Chris) Crime is confusing.
I've got him, he's over here.
His name is Ritchie Blawse.
Look at the front of his head, you've seen it before.
He was on this programme saying, "I'm giving up crime."
Why have you gone back to crime? He doesn't know.
Tonight on Brass Eye, why has he gone back to crime?
"UK" used to mean United Kingdom
but ask anyone today and they'll tell you it stands for
Unbelievable Crimewave.
No one is safe.
By the end of tomorrow, one or all of these people
may have been set on fire, bum-raped or burgled senseless by criminals.
This month, police pictures showed another estate in Manchester
turning itself into a gun.
It's not just the great unhosed.
These raiders all earn over £200,000 a year in big banks.
So much for recorded crimes
but crimes we know nothing about are going up as well.
What hope do we have of battering these down?
The Home Secretary scores repeated own goals.
Over 1,200 convicts were released last month
after lying to the Home Office about how long they'd been inside.
And just two days ago,
it was revealed that convicts in Dartmoor Prison
had been running an international airport for over 14 years.
I am not an expert on air traffic control.
I thought they were landing nearby but not in my prison.
So what causes crime?
Social deprivation? This bleak report from Ted Maul.
From the moon, Cowsick's a little dot.
From the ground, it's a huge mess,
Iike Dante meets Bosch in a crack lounge.
I'm here to ask a question - is alarm justified?
Is time running out for Cowsick or is this the start of a new day?
The first day of spring.
Cowsick. The stench of poverty hangs in the air like an old man's nappy.
For the kids, it's a depravity supermarket,
where bad is free and society foots the bill.
Not many cars to nick here, so they hijack pedestrians
and run them around at terrifying leg speeds.
It's called "git surfing".
All too often, the "git" is one of their own mothers.
The latest trick - catapult them into a shop...
and force them to steal booze, fags and mags.
(Police chatter)
For the cops, it's a jungle...
where dangerous animals speak Swear-hili.
Sounds like we got a burst shop.
Kids burst shops by filling them with rice
and pouring in water, then standing back and laughing
while the bricks are ripped apart by the swelling food.
They say a bored mind makes a great office for the devil.
In Kerry Hufford's case, it's fully air-conditioned with free typing.
He's been arrested for menacing a helpless codger.
Jill and Sainsbur McManus are a rattly pair of old puffins
who remember Cowsick when people could still be trusted.
Everybody had keys to everybody else's house
and the locks were sort of made of something like paper.
On September the 15th, the McManuses went to bed,
unaware they were being watched by the Hufford gang.
Moments later, three kids had broken in.
Kerry was dressed as an angel.
He woke the old man up and told him he was dead
and must go outside and bury himself.
He ran out the room,
Kerry and me were rolling on the floor in hysterics
and he was pulling all the grass out, and chucking it everywhere
and we were just laughing at him.
Sainsbur would definitely be Costa del Blowfly
if the cops hadn't seen him by chance
while they were tracking a man who'd buggered a heron.
Maybe we can understand kids like Kerry by looking at his family.
Dad, unemployed. Mum, depressed beyond tablets.
You want to help them but they've got to help themselves.
Do you agree with this question - if you don't get a job, he gets stuffed?
I'm trying to get a job. It's not like I'm not trying.
- You must try harder. - I'm trying.
- But really hard. - I am.
Couldn't you just go round somebody's house and clean up?
Clean up somebody's house?
- Then ask for money for it. - I could do that.
Why not do that tomorrow?
- All right. It's a bit demea... - Good. Thanks for talking to us.
Cowsick people are the smashed toes of a lame duck society.
A lame duck that's attacking its own feet with a sledgehammer.
Will the nightmare ever end for Cowsick?
Perhaps with outside help. Oh, yeah?
In 1993, the council gave them a football.
Good...but not enough.
In '95, Paul McCartney donated 100 top hats.
Fat use.
And last year, the mayor gave them a gold mine.
It actually worked for a bit until someone clogged it up with sick.
Sick's a met-aphor for the way these people lead their lives
and it'll stay that way until someone lets in the wind of change.
And as a result of that experience,
Ted Maul has been absent for some time with nervous exhaust.
Do you feel that vigilantism is gonna help in the long run?
I think it will arise in an area where something has gone wrong.
In Gotham City in the States
they call a specialist vigilante agent when they're in real trouble
by projecting a huge, luminous emergency bat sign into the sky
and he comes rushing in and so far, that has...worked.
Is that something that should be encouraged?
- I'd have to see it. - Well, it looks good.
It'd have to be a very, er...
Individual with great magnetism.
I think that's what it is. It's his special sign.
They're one-offs and it's very nice.
In school-mastering we have people who could do it in a unique way
but don't try and get other people doing it.
But when Bruce Wayne goes, it's all gonna collapse.
Yeah. Yeah, but it's happened throughout history.
Is crime gonna get any worse?
Yes, it is. Just look at America.
Alabaster Codify reports on their latest mess.
Fadanoid with Chuck Fadanoid.
(Codify) 'Top talk topic Stateside right now.
The priests who say they must pack a piece to keep the peace.
Last week I had a... Well 200 or 300 in the congregation.
I got up and I said,
"Anybody here who's got a gun can leave now."
Ten minutes later, three people had left - two kids and a deaf guy.
The padre-noia really took off after Minister Vocas Wabe
was shot at a baptism for forgetting the baby's name.
Fuckin' asshole!
More and more, the holy flock is becoming a gory gun-gregation.
Practising four times a week,
Father Coopex, a fully-fledged Revolverend.
Liked your style there.
I use the one-handed grip, it gives you a smaller profile
if there's answering fire, like from the congregation.
In Coopex' church, a would-be shootist doesn't have a prayer.
This is a defensive measure which is bulletproof,
and a hole has been cut so I can return fire.
That was the pimp that took my crucifix and put it on his car.
The holy gun-spel according to St Marksman.
I got him that time.
There's even ad campaigns to recruit more pistol apostles.
- (TV) 'No room at the inn? - (Gunfire)
- 'There is now. - (Gunfire)
Judas, you plan to betray me.
(Gunfire and manic laughter)
Despite the increasing violence against priests,
many say they are too revved up to handle guns.
At this wedding, Minister Pat Rizzo shot a guest in the leg.
The issue peaked on TV on a rat-a-tat-tat show showdown
featuring Coopex and the two prota-gunnists.
- You were shot by a minister? - Right.
You were shot by this minister with a gun?
This is Pat Rizzo, the man who shot at the wedding.
You haven't seen him since he shot you. React.
What the hell were you doing?
You moved funny, I had to shoot.
What?! I was at a wedding.
You looked like a criminal!
Look at those hairy arms, you could be a man in a dress.
- You! I'm gonna get you. - (Pat) Don't...
(Man) Freeze. (Fadanoid) Put the gun down.
Someone could get shot here. Pouch that piece, Padre.
- Stay where you are. - Pouch that piece!
Two priests left the show in a tank, shooting as they went.
As the ammu-missionaries get trigger-holy,
Sunday turns to gun-day
and America awaits the Blast Judgment.
This is Alabaster Codify, for 10NN and Brass Eye.
Sadly, crime experts predict that one day,
even friendly conversation between mother and daughter
will be conducted at gunpoint.
Up next, a new scheme for young offenders.
Take the Cashback scheme that they're gonna try in Toxteth,
where young offenders are on a 14-week sentence.
It costs two grand a week to keep them,
so rather than spend 28 grand to keep them inside,
they give them 25 grand and say, "Here you are,
"use that for a positive reason."
I think that's a smashing idea. Yeah, I do, honestly.
If they had done that to you, what would have happened?
I don't think you'd have ever heard of me again.
Would enlisting somebody like Richard Branson to sell the Cashback scheme
might just work?
I wouldn't say no to that.
I suppose if there was an element of stick,
Richard Branson up in a balloon watching this situation saying,
"There's your £26,000 but I'm watching you from a balloon
"and I can see a very long way."
I'd go along with that.
Now chafing the transmission heads,
what is the relationship between crime and race?
Using make-up sticks, we transformed our white reporter,
Trass Dupress, into a black man
to see if the law would treat him any differently.
Within five minutes, he'd committed a pocket theft.
By mid-afternoon, he was attacking passers-by with violent muggings
and fleecing them viciously on the cobbles.
There's the evidence. Mr Koka, what do you make of that?
Now I've seen the proof, I apologise for my fellow blacks, I'm sorry.
Thank you very much.
What's the solution to rising crime,
particularly younger and younger?
For many, the answer to the problem can be summed up in just one word.
Bring back borstal.
But did they work?
Good question because borstals were phased out in 1982.
Ted Maul reports.
Borstals like Fork Hurst are to be axed
as they're full of men who should have been released.
(Ted) 'Jock Bosonet was sent here as a juvenile offender in 1949.
He never left because he kept failing release tests.
Like hundreds of others, he remained in chokey,
even though the offences were small and twatty.
When I was seven, I got dressed up as a little city gent...
and walked into the Bank of England shouting for a pound.
While the situation is grave enough
to merit a black-and-white freeze-frame,
the solution may be at hand
with the opening of Harsh Pounds for young offenders.
Libby Shuss reports.
Leobald Quay, opened six months ago right here,
and already is favoured by both main political parties.
And the third party, who are with Ashdown.
I'm going inside now, like a bad boy.
The new inmates are welcomed on arrival...
You shits! Up that hill!
..and are sent straight to the shaving room.
Here, their eyebrows are shaved off,
which undermines their self-respect rather well.
(Man) If you think of a fly and you pull its wings off, it'll crawl.
But if you push the back half of its body
onto the surface it's squiggling on...
then you've got its total, undivided attention.
In the Gulf War, Jackson was Allied advisor on psycho battery.
At Leobald, his expertise is applied without mercy.
The inmates' sleep is frequently interrupted.
(Screams)
Room inspections are full of sneaky traps,
like the brass moustache hidden behind a notice board.
Why didn't you polish it?
- How funny is it? - Not, sir.
Bury the beds. Mattresses, pillows, sheets, bury!
The men will dig up their bedclothes this evening
and sleep in them, all earthy.
If they'd done better, they might have won a privilege.
Despite his criminal mind, this man is behaving well.
His reward is the canoe.
This time he can sit in the canoe for up to an hour.
Meanwhile, the troublemaker
is made to sprint blindfold to Jackson's office,
where he receives a speaking down.
That is my shiny shoe and you are a big piece of shit on it.
- Sir. - Lick yourself off my shoe.
Lick yourself off my shoe.
Lick the shit off his shoe!
Don't actually do it! Where's your self-re-cocking-spect?
- I don't know, sir. - Get out! Now!
- Sir. - Look at me. Get out.
(Jackson) If you take a seal and hit it very hard in the face
every day for six weeks,
you may turn it into a rather fetching hat.
And the future for these fuckers?
Will they succeed in returning to society?
So, you're nearing the end of your training, your regime,
and looking forward to joining society.
How do you feel about that?
- I haven't got skills. - Skills? For what?
Getting back into society.
- You could have a family and... - I could have, I don't know.
- (Laughter) - Now, if...you made the effort,
became a part of a family,
then you could root yourself into the fabric of society.
- I'll root you into fuckin' society! - (Laughter)
There is a serious question. I am from society...
We know.
You're not from society, how do you get back into society?
- Up your arse. - (Laughter)
There are no simple answers to the problem of punishment
but there is a simple question.
Would it really matter if one of these men died?
Perhaps the most positive step
has come from the Home Office action group, Key 2000,
who produced a video to play to young offenders
on their arrival in prison.
Well, they got you, then.
They gone and banged you up good and proper. So, what now?
What I'd like to do right now is take your bad half outside
and do it an extremely physical discourtesy
and then buy your good half a pint of foaming, nut-brown ale.
Cheers.
Meet Geoff Boycott
and shake hands with a walking continent of common sense.
I didn't get runs by slacking.
I worked hard, I grafted, I practised,
I did it as well as I could, properly.
So when you get up in the morning, what do you do?
You get out of bed properly,
and that means all the way out of it, get right out of the bed.
No half measures. You must get your whole body out of the bed,
right out from under the sheets,
right off the mattress until you're standing up.
You won't get anywhere slouching about half out of bed.
Do you seriously think the people here wouldn't notice
if you were only half out of the bed?
Come on, wise up.
Did I walk out to bat when I was half asleep or half out of bed?
Of course not. I bloody well didn't.
Remember, the best technique is to look at that bed
and then try and get as far away from it as possible.
Gary Glitter said, "Good to be back,"
but in your case, that does not apply.
I can't believe it, you little ponce.
You've gone and done it again, ain'cha?
Did you really like it so much last time?
What? You didn't? Then why the hell did you come back?
All right, easy now. No foaming nut-brown ale for you this time
but here, for God's sake, listen to this and do us a favour,
pay attention this time.
I've been asked to read the words of a successful reformed criminal,
someone who got a grip, and this is what he says -
"Remember that your life in prison is like a dog in a box.
"What you've got to do is make the dog bigger than the box.
"Not in a bad way, like a mad wolf in a matchbox,
"but more like a giant,
"a well-behaved Alsatian in a Kleenex box.
"Your aim is to place that dog in the lap of the governor -
"that's the evil part of you - with a smile, as you leave."
You are a murderer and I can only pray to God
that you watch and you listen very carefully to this.
Hello. You think you don't know me, don't you?
Yes, but you do because I'm the shopkeeper you shot
in a mindless hold-up.
You blew out my guts, remember?
I'm the old lady whose head you stove in with a wardrobe
in the middle of the night, remember?
I'm the boy whose face you stabbed off in panic
when I found you robbing my house, remember?
I'm Marvin Gaye, shot by my own father.
Oh, yes, you know me all right.
Look at my eyes, murderer, you killed me.
What the hell did you do that for?
Look at me! Feel proud, do you?
Do you even know what a feeling is?
I do but I can't have any more now because of you. You!
You get out after 25 years but me, I'm here forever.
I hate you.
While you're inside, you'll have to learn a new language.
It's not French, it's prison slang.
I've got some of it here so it might help you.
"Howard's arse" means prison.
"One-nil at half-time" means food.
"Woggy coconuts" means air bricks.
"Gazza" is a Gascoigne used as currency for cigarettes.
"Plank sanction" - a one-for-one fag exchange.
"Sue my chin" - give us a fag, I'll give you two next week.
"Buff my pylon" - give us a fag, you owe me two
so I'm letting you off the other one.
"Don't buff my pylon" - switch over the telly.
And, er, very important this one,
"Portillo" means look out behind you.
Learn the language, better communication.
That's one way of dealing with offenders,
but what about the bigger picture?
- Thanks to the news dwarf. - Pleasure.
The hope is we'll benefit from a number of European projects.
Research shows that football riots can be halted instantly
by showing pornography on the video displays.
For street disturbances, the police are breeding elephants,
following their successful deployment in Athens and Turin.
In Holland, they've halved the crime rate by legalising murder,
introducing slaughter cafes.
We used to come here with knives and slash them in the guts
but we got bored after that, after about two weeks,
I just eat my cake now and wash it down with a cup of coff.
This French system of victim support comes to Britain soon.
Last month, that woman found a young offender defecating on her floor.
Under police supervision, she meets the offender at his house.
And is given an hour to formalise a similar return on his floor.
Good night.
I'm violently against hanging.
I believe no human's got the right to take another's life.
So, you shouldn't be allowed to take someone's life?
No, what I'm saying is...
The penalty for taking a life should be the death penalty?
No, I personally am totally opposed to the death penalty.
- But it's OK to take a life? - No, only in self-defence.
If you murder somebody, you've taken away their life,
and in that circumstance only, that person should be killed.
No. I believe under no circumstances
does one human being have the right to take another's life.
- No way, surely. - That's my opinion.
I'm not saying it's... Everything's about opinions.
Is it? Yes, it is. What about capital punishment for murder?
No, I personally believe on moral grounds
that no human being can take another's life.
Or if you didn't take their life, just murdered them?
Say that again.
If you didn't take somebody's life, you just murdered them...