What roughly happened before you met and started working with your current case manager?

I first got to work with an organization that is also involved in this project in 2007, when I was released from prison. I lived in a big city, my way of life there was such that I was on heroin, I slept on the streets… When I was released from prison, I was back under the influence of opiates and under the influence of the street that very day. As a homeless person, I basically had to commit crimes, and I knew I was in trouble again. My brother took me to live with him in another city, from where I moved here and contacted this organization through a friend. A condition for joining the project, which was operating here at the time, was to be released from prison and deal with one’s addiction. So I applied for an open competition, which I won. I lived in a social apartment for about five years and basically functioned. They helped me get a job with the Municipal Police as a crime prevention assistant. At the same time, I have the experience of a person who had a conflict with the law and one who was on the other side as an employee of the Municipal Police.

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“As a homeless person, I basically had to commit crimes, and I knew I was in trouble again.”
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After 14 years, however, I lost my job with the Municipal Police. It was caused by excessive drinking, mental health problems and methamphetamine use. I didn’t keep an eye on it and I was on opiates again and after more than 15 years I got behind bars again. Thanks to one of my fellow prisoners, I got in touch with another organization in this project and began to work with them on what would happen after my release. I started meeting the case manager in prison a few months before my release. At first, I didn’t really believe that it would help me in any way. I don’t think I was so much limited by addiction, but by an overall social decline. During my sentence, I lost my municipal apartment, which I had thanks to my work in the police. I also cut off all my social ties. At the age of 41, with a bag in my hand, I found myself back at square one. They helped me pay for my accommodation for the first weeks after the release, get basic necessities, hygiene, a tram ticket. Before the release, we talked with the case manager in the prison about how my return to life outside prison would go. I wanted to go back to the city by myself, have some beer and breathe a little. I walked out of the office, thought about it for about ten minutes later, and said to myself that maybe it’s safer to try something different than having a beer and getting tangled up again.

I was in prison for the fifth time, I told myself that it couldn’t go any further. I basically lost everything and I tried to postpone what it would be like after I got out of prison. The closer the release was, the people around me were more excited about it, but I didn’t feel like laughing much.

Who do you think such support is suitable for and does it have a chance of success?

I think it’s more suitable for people who already have some life experience. Not so much for those who are in prison for the first time and can very easily return to addiction, they do not yet have a lot of things settled and clear. I think it’s better to offer such help to people who have some life experience, so that they can withstand everything. But the release would certainly not have been easy for me even if I didn’t have this support. You say to yourself: it’s perfect that I’m going to leave the prison, but what now.

If I had been all alone after the release, it would have been completely different. A person may take some money from prison, but they do not really think about spending it mainly on providing decent housing. However, having housing is really crucial, one can then work on oneself with more peace, try to look for a job and not be in need and tension again.

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“It’s often quite difficult to make sure that a person can live decently. So the fact that I had housing secured for the first month after my release was really important to me.”
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You’ve talked about the problems caused by social decline during your time in prison. Is it similar for other convicts?

Social issues are really behind a lot of the stories I’ve come across in prison. I worked as a prevention assistant in a socially excluded locality. I know the environment very well. Most people there live in great weakness and face various social setbacks. At the same time, it’s often quite difficult to make sure that a person can live decently. So the fact that I had housing secured for the first month after my release was really important to me.

From my experience in prison, I can confirm that a large proportion of the people who are in prison today have a problem with some kind of addiction and are dealing with a whole range of social problems. It is usually fifty fifty for them after they get out of the prison.

Do you perceive that the situation in prisons has been deteriorating in recent years?

It’s shifting, I think social decline is great among people in general today. Those who were poor before I went to prison are now completely poor. Those who didn’t have much certainty have none at all today. This applies not only to the homeless and drug addicts, but often also to pensioners and other socially vulnerable people. I’ve always thought a lot about the world and tried to feel the emotions of the time. I am trying to write poems about that.

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“From my experience in prison, I can confirm that a large proportion of the people who are in prison today have a problem with some kind of addiction and are dealing with a whole range of social problems. It is usually fifty fifty for them after they get out of the prison.“
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How are you today? What other things do you need to deal with at this point?

I’m still trying to solve all these things in the long term and I’m trying to find a position where I can anchor somewhere. The moment a person has lost de facto everything, it’s not just about finding a job and immediately functioning normally again. You are looking for things back on a personal and life level that make sense to you. It’s harder than I thought. It’s about each individual, how they can tolerate different things and how many options they have. For example, I am thinking about my latest book. I have it mostly written, it’s very important for me to be able to publish it and that it will look good.

I also deal with my health and mental situation. I’m in contact with a psychiatrist, I’m taking some pills, but it’s not because I need to dope or go back to addiction. Thanks to the support and involvement in this project, I am actually doing quite well by current standards.

I am now discussing the possibility of joining a full-time job in various positions. It’s not just about money, it’s going to help me function better overall in life. Like the first time when I got out of prison, went to work on a construction site and for the first time earned money by working with my hands. It was something completely new to me, since then I have not committed any more crimes. At least I was able to live with my brother for a while, eighty percent of people go out of prison back to where they were. If someone is in prison for the first time, both parents and relatives take care of them. They do not do that anymore after this happens for the second or third time.

Greater peace and confidence is then reflected in my writing. I don’t just write about myself and the sad things in my own life. I wrote more about that in my first book, now I’m more sad about the whole time. Some people may say that such social projects mean just flushing money, but I think it makes a lot of sense. Most of those workers don’t have much from similar projects themselves. So it can’t be said that anyone can make money on it or that they can do some kind of politics. I really appreciate the help I received. In my opinion, it is a meaningful and very valuable project that should be preserved and continue to function.

Did a certain amount of trust that your brother or case manager had in you help you? Did you feel that there was someone you could rely on?

Rather, I felt that they trusted me. They gave me that space, which I didn’t even expect. I have other siblings, but they all have children and other lives, they are somewhere else. So I couldn’t count on going to them. Why should it be like that when they have their own children and have nothing to do with me? They were sending me some things to the prison, one is not ashamed to ask for such help. But after years in prison, I can’t expect to come out and they will take me in. It doesn’t work, it doesn’t work that way.

The transcription of an interview for the third evaluation report was shortened and edited by Václav Zeman.