The young offenders are housed in one of four boarding houses, with four 'educators'
for each house. Such a ratio of the educator to less than 25 people would be envied even
in central Europe but it was clear that the 'educators' were not undertaking the positive
role of Polish case managers, for example. The simply supervise the psychologists,
teachers and other treatment staff. Prisoners attend school, do manual work (with timber
and with metal) or work on normal institutional tasks. Half study in the morning while the
others work and in the afternoon the roles are reversed. The institution bakes its own
bread.
Since 1993 there has been a chapel (prayer room) in the institution and there are now
very close links between the (Russian Orthodox) church and the prison administration.
The 297 staff include three psychologists who were said to work fairly intensively with
those needing their assistance. The institution also receives help from individuals from
France and Germany and, especially, from an Australian doctor John Allen who has uprooted
himself from his country and, through the good offices of MCPR,
attached himself to this juvenile colony.
The director, whose name was Vasily Pulin, clearly tolerates — even
encourages — the positive things done by Father Mikhail, the psychologists and the
Australian doctor, but he did not himself give the impression of being an initiator.
Indeed, he sounded rather 'old school' in his answering of questions, stating that they do
not explain to prisoners their rights because they already know the law, and claiming that
there is no sexual abuse in the dormitories when other staff told us otherwise.
It seemed that a significant part of the reason for the atmosphere in the institution
was attributable to the influence of Father Mikhail and his assistant Yevgeny. There was
no doubt that an important medical contribution was made by the Australian doctor. MCPR personnel and the experts they had brought with them (a
lawyer, an economist) agrees that in was important to boost the director in the freedom he
gave to such staff and in the generally positive atmosphere he allowed in the institution.
To grill him too aggressively about the evident weaknesses of the place or to criticise
them too vehemently to the regional authorities would have made it likely that he would
have been replaced on a less accommodating director.
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