2023 - Posca acrylic marker on former police issue polycarbonate riot shield and former police issue HIATTS handcuffs.
At the beginning of 2010, I went a bit mental for a bit. In mid-March I was taken to Fulbourn Psychiatric Hospital, under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act 1983. When I arrived, it was night time. I was given a sleep sedative and fell asleep immediately.
When I woke up, I made it quite clear that I was going to be less than ideal company. After making lots of noise, tagging the walls and going in both feet with tea, biscuits and fags, I’d had quite enough of Fulbourn by about 10am. I knew that the hospital was on the same bus route as my parents’ road, and that it’d be a short journey to get back home. I decided to test the waters. I climbed on the smoking shelter, jumped the fence and started running.
Within seconds alarms started wailing, and staff came running from all the surrounding buildings. After not really, very a long time, I stopped running. I sat down on a bench and suddenly had many, many hands on me. I was stood up and walked back to the ward.
Not long after arriving back on the ward I went to use the toilet. I went in, locked the door, finished and washed my hands. I opened the door. Standing at the door, with his 2ft by 2ft riot shield blocking the door, was a police officer who was built like The Undertaker. I just started laughing.
From my limited experience of police, it’s my understanding that when they bring out the riot shields, it’s often going to be a difficult day for everyone involved. Neither of us said anything. At the time I was about eight and a half stone, and not built like The Undertaker. We both understood one another. Out of fear of getting choke-slammed through the bathroom sink, I turned around, got down on my knees and put my hands behind my head. He politely, yet firmly, placed my hands behind my back, and attached a pair of cold, rigid handcuffs.
As we left the bathroom I saw seven more rather large police officers stacked up along the corridor. When they saw me, I couldn’t help but feel a distinct wave of ‘is that it?’ coming from them. They parted, disappointedly. I was briskly swept into a small room.
A doctorly type administration person was already sitting in the small room. As police man and I sat down together, they proceeded to explain some of the complex legal things. They were boring. Also, I was distracted by the handcuff situation, and the Undertaker’s hand on my shoulder. I heard the words ‘secure unit in Peterborough’, and my attention was immediately locked back in to what they were saying.
From Fulbourn, I was first taken to Parkside Police Station in the back of a police van, hands still cuffed behind my back. I sat in a cell and waited for a couple of hours, hands still cuffed behind my back. Once a bed opened at Peterborough, I was returned to the back of the police van, hands still cuffed behind my back. I was taken to The Cavell Centre, and into their ‘Poplar Intensive Care Unit’, hands still cuffed behind my back. I was greeted briefly by one of the nurses, and walked up the long central corridor to a small, blank room.
As they took the handcuffs off, I started to miss Fulbourn.