# Wrongly convicted prisoners to pay room and board **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 17, 2004, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929 "2004-03-17T22:59:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/1 "2004-03-17T22:59:29Z")
Here’s an interesting story: [http://www.guardian.co.uk/prisons/story/0,7369,1170170,00.html](http://www.guardian.co.uk/prisons/story/0,7369,1170170,00.html) Apparently, some innocent men tricked the British government into providing them years of free room and board by pretending to be honest criminals. And now they’re getting taught a proper lesson. Thank God that this miscarriage of justice will not stand! > [@](#): > > Michael O’Brien, one of the Cardiff Three wrongly convicted of murder, spent 11 years in prison before being freed by the appeal court. He later received £125,000 in compensation. Lord Brennan, the independent assessor appointed by the government, deducted £37,000 for what he called saved living expenses. ---
**Author:** ![caphis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19adc/32.png) [@caphis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/caphis)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/2 "2004-03-17T23:03:54Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Here’s an interesting story: > > [http://www.guardian.co.uk/prisons/story/0,7369,1170170,00.html](http://www.guardian.co.uk/prisons/story/0,7369,1170170,00.html) > > Apparently, some innocent men tricked the British government into providing them years of free room and board by pretending to be honest criminals. And now they’re getting taught a proper lesson. Thank God that this miscarriage of justice will not stand! _phew_ For a second, I thought from the title that actual wrongly convicted people were being forced to pay room and board for their unintentional stays. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/3 "2004-03-17T23:45:14Z")
Um…they are, or at least the British government is trying to make them. > [@](#): > > Officials are challenging a high court decision that former prisoners, including the Cardiff Three, Birmingham Six and Bridgewater Four, who won appeals against conviction, should not be charged for their board and lodging. > > If the appeal succeeds men such as Vincent and Michael Hickey, **who served 18 years after being wrongfully convicted** of the murder of Carl Bridgewater, will have to pay £60,000 each, about a quarter of the compensation they received. ---
**Author:** ![caphis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19adc/32.png) [@caphis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/caphis)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/4 "2004-03-18T00:05:49Z")
> [@Otto](#): > > Um…they are, or at least the British government is trying to make them. Wow. Just when you think they can’t get any lower. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/5 "2004-03-18T00:10:47Z")
I think **Otto** and **CompuKnowYerNamesTooLong** were _both_ whooshed. Simply because I like the sound it makes. ---
**Author:** ![mike1dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@mike1dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mike1dog)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/6 "2004-03-18T00:13:51Z")
What’s next? Charging executed criminals for their execution? ---
**Author:** ![Reeder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Reeder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reeder)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/7 "2004-03-18T00:17:23Z")
> [@mike1dog](#): > > What’s next? Charging executed criminals for their execution? No, the guilty ones don’t have to pay. Just the innocent ones. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/8 "2004-03-18T00:28:05Z")
> [@Reeder](#): > > No, the guilty ones don’t have to pay. > > Just the innocent ones. Exactly. If you are guilty and they execute you, you are legally entitled to the use of the state’s bullets for your execution. But if you are innocent, aren’t you STEALING those bullets? ---
**Author:** ![Celyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9dc877/32.png) [@Celyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Celyn)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/9 "2004-03-18T01:12:01Z")
[QUOTE=Lemur866] Exactly. If you are guilty and they execute you, you are legally entitled to the use of the state’s bullets for your execution. …QUOTE] Yep, that certainly would seem to be the “logic” of it. :9 But, just for clarity, let me remark that we no long have capital punishment in the U.K. And that story! Well, when I read it earlier in the week, I really thought I must be imagining things. Had to read it about three times to believe it was serious. Take 20 years of someone’s life away, then charge money for it? I wonder what our government will think of next. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/10 "2004-03-18T02:35:15Z")
> [@mike1dog](#): > > What’s next? Charging executed criminals for their execution? No, let’s just send the bill for the bullet to their familes. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/11 "2004-03-18T03:37:15Z")
I am amazed at the assessed value of English prison cuisine. Or are English prisoners served French cuisine imported directly from Maxim’s? Innocent people locked up by the government have it better in America. When they are released after some years locked up in Guantanamo the US government does not charge them anything for room and board. And that would be worth a lot when you consider it is a dream paradise destination in the Caribbean. I don’t know what the food is like though. Maybe it’s just McDonalds in which case it would not add up to much. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/12 "2004-03-18T04:05:02Z")
> [@sailor](#): > > Innocent people locked up by the government have it better in America. [snip] I don’t know what the food is like though. Maybe it’s just McDonalds in which case it would not add up to much. This is going to sound, ummm, incriminating, but I’ve eaten the food at a number of fine correctional facilities around the Midwest. Trust me, McDonald’s would be a huuuuge improvement. Note to self: when going to jail, bring your own lunch if at all possible. (Before you get too curious, these were business trips; I was interpreting for deportation hearings held in prisons. Never a dull moment on that job. It was very educational.) ---
**Author:** ![hybrid\_dogfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@hybrid\_dogfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hybrid_dogfish)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/13 "2004-03-18T14:59:46Z")
Well, I read somewhere that some homeless people prefer to be in prison over christmas because shelters charge for christmas dinner and don’t serve chippolatas 😉 It does raise the question of how punishing prison can be though if it can be valued at £60 a day, a night in a Travel Lodge hotel in manchester would only set you back £49.95, albeit without food. Come to think of it, I pay less than that full board at college, I mean, the food is bad, but does this mean that the prisoners in HMP Durham (maximum security as far as I am aware) are getting better food than me? This is just sickening.the charges, not the college food, although that isn’t far off ---
**Author:** ![Eats\_Crayons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/278dde/32.png) [@Eats\_Crayons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eats_Crayons)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2004, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/14 "2004-03-18T15:21:11Z")
> [@Eva Luna](#): > > This is going to sound, ummm, incriminating, but I’ve eaten the food at a number of fine correctional facilities around the Midwest. Trust me, McDonald’s would be a huuuuge improvement. Yeah, but then you’d have the inmates suing that McDonald’s made them fat. That wouldn’t work well. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2004, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/15 "2004-03-19T03:43:52Z")
> [@](#): > > What’s next? Charging executed criminals for their execution? Well, I know some former psychiatric inmates who were involuntarily electroshocked and then billed for the electricity. Does that count? ---
**Author:** ![Ale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@Ale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ale)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2004, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/16 "2004-03-19T04:12:59Z")
Are you sure this is not something from Monty Python? Guard-´ello Pete; I´ve got two news for you, a good one and a bad one. Bearded Prisoner-The bad one first, please. G-You´re free, you were not guilty, it took us 18 years to sort that out though… BP-Good Lord!, what could be the good news then? G-Uhmm, here´s the bill. BP-What!!! _springs up and grabs his shirt over the heart_ ACK!!! _Drops stone dead_ G- Oh no, not another one; I never wanted to be a prison guard anyway, I wanted to be a lumberjack, leaping from tree to tree… _music cue, mounties enter scene_ ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2004, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/17 "2004-03-19T04:36:53Z")
> [@hybrid\_dogfish](#): > > It does raise the question of how punishing prison can be though if it can be valued at £60 a day, a night in a Travel Lodge hotel in manchester would only set you back £49.95, albeit without food. Actually, if you read the article a little more closely, you’ll see that it’s actually 60 quid a _week_. Sounds like a bargain to me. Seriously, though, this is fucked up. It really does sound like something from Monty Python. Listen to what the authorities have to say about it, from [this Irish Examiner story](http://www.examiner.ie/pport/web/Full_Story/did-sgNa7cLIe-zgssglO-LCk0lQvU.asp): > [@](#): > > A spokesperson for the British Home Office said the purpose of compensation was “to place the person in the position they would have been had they not been wrongly convicted. It is absolutely not the case that the prison service asks victims of miscarriages of justice to repay them bed and board,” he said. “To place the person in the position they would have been had they not been wrongly convicted”? What the fuck? The guy in this story gives some idea of what the wrongful conviction cost him: > [@](#): > > "It cost me my marriage and both my father and my daughter died while I was in jail. My son was one when I went to jail and I am still trying to build a relationship with him. What can compensate for that?” > > Mr O’Brien’s father, Jimmy O’Brien, from Wexford, died in 1997 . His daughter, Kylie, suffered a cot death at the age of three months, while Mr O’Brien was on remand. Mr O’Brien is studying law, but has been told, because of mental health problems, that he will not work again. No amount of compensation could begin to make up for this, and to reduce the compensation payments in the way they are doing adds egregious insult to the worst of injuries. The Home Office’s use of the term “saved living expenses” to describe these deductions would have Orwell chortling with glee. ---
**Author:** ![xcheopis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/bc8723/32.png) [@xcheopis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xcheopis)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2004, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/18 "2004-03-19T05:01:31Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > The Home Office’s use of the term “saved living expenses” to describe these deductions would have Orwell chortling with glee. No, it would have had him almost frothing with rage at the injustice. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2004, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/19 "2004-03-19T05:10:46Z")
> [@xcheopis](#): > > No, it would have had him almost frothing with rage at the injustice. True. I guess i figured he would also be happy–or at least little bit flattered–that he had been so prescient. ---
**Author:** ![xcheopis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/bc8723/32.png) [@xcheopis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xcheopis)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2004, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929/20 "2004-03-19T05:24:00Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > True. I guess i figured he would also be happy–or at least little bit flattered–that he had been so prescient. Maybe flattered but more like unsurprised. Angry, sad, and not the least bit surprised. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wrongly-convicted-prisoners-to-pay-room-and-board/234929.md?page=2)