Detainees out of control, psychological pressure from the bosses, the daily life under tension of the guards of the Toulouse-Seysses remand center
In an overcrowded prison, the prison staff of the Toulouse-Seysses remand center must manage more and more detainees with severe psychiatric pathologies or who are ready to take all the risks in order to establish their position within the prison. .
It happened a few days ago on the third floor of the Seysses prison. There was a pestilential smell coming from a cell. As the guards opened the door, they gasped. The prisoner had painted the walls of his jail with his own excrement. “In recent years, among prisoners, we have seen more and more serious psychiatric cases. Quite simply because there is not enough room for them in secure hospitals”, reports Clensy, guard at Seysses and member of the SPS, (prison guards’ union). The young man largely returned from the speeches he heard during his training: “Our instructors sold us the idea that we were going to play a role in the reintegration of incarcerated people. The reality is that there is one supervisor for 130 inmates, in fact, we are reduced to being simple door openers. The prison was designed to accommodate 595 inmates, today there are more than 1,000.” The supervisor must live with constant psychological pressure even outside working hours.” A few months ago, Clensy had a funny surprise when he returned to his home.
“Fire at the Jail”
The walls at the entrance to his home had been tagged overnight. We could read “Fire at the prison” or even “Rather a baker than a maton” undoubtedly a direct reference to Hensy’s rather massive physique… “The prisoners or their relatives film us or can photograph our vehicles. This allows us to locate, to know where we live. It’s a way for them to try to exert psychological pressure on us”, assures David Mathieu, local secretary of the SPS, employed in Seysses since 2004.
The profile of delinquents imprisoned in Seysses has changed in recent years. The number of foreign prisoners jumped at the expense of locals. Julien, an experienced guard, remembers an event which, with hindsight, sounds like a change of era: “I saw one of the bosses from the Toulouse neighborhoods running in the courtyard. As he ran he was screaming: save me , they’re going to plant me! He had people from Mostaganem(1) on his heels… This scene would have been unimaginable a few months earlier. The balance of power had clearly changed.”
The power to change hands
To the detriment of prison staff, as David Mathieu explains: “The bandits in the neighborhoods more or less respected the rules. They knew that by going off course, they risked a transfer. And that, they did not want. “The relatives, the family, it is vital for them. Those of Mostaganem, most of them in an irregular situation, have nothing to lose. They are potentially more dangerous for the prisoners and for the supervisors.”
For the local secretary of the SPS, there is more serious. The action of the projectors, these individuals who swing parcels over the enclosure walls intended for the detainees, weakens the remand center: “They swing stup. This favors the settling of scores for traffic control. If we manage to curb this scourge, it will largely calm the atmosphere. For that, we obviously need more human resources”, The SPS calls for around thirty additional supervisory positions, a handful of which would have the mission of prevent the “projectors” from operating.