Sheridan: Will he be a hero behind bars?

Published on Friday 21 January 2011 18:00

WHEN Tommy Sheridan walked into Greenock Prison, his head held high, in 2000, he was greeted with a bigger ovation than Johnny Cash at San Quentin. Jailed for refusing to pay a fine for a breach of the peace at a Faslane protest he was inundated with offers of teabags, milk and phone cards by cons impressed by their fellow inmate's celebrity status.

• A Saughton Prison guard holds open the door for Sheridan after a press conference in 1992 when he was standing in the general election. Photograph: Ian Rutherford

Hundreds of messages of support, which filled up postal sacks and bunged up the fax machine, were brought to him by bemused but largely congenial warders. Sheridan was not - after all - a real criminal. He was a prisoner of conscience; a working-class hero and an MSP to boot. After a quick game of football and a short-tennis competition, he was released wearing a T-shirt with the legend 'Scotland Nuclear-Free', safe in the knowledge that his brief incarceration would have bolstered his public image.

How things have changed. When Sheridan leaves the High Court in Glasgow after sentencing on Wednesday it will not be as a political dissident, but as a convicted perjurer, facing a lengthy sentence. Once in jail, as before, he will be subjected to the induction ritual - the shower, the stripping off, the anal inspection - but without the compensation of knowing a hero's welcome awaits him.

Although a conviction for lying in court is unlikely to provoke particular hostility from the other cons, Sheridan's champion of the oppressed image has been tarnished in recent years. Even his friends concede that, except amongst his most devoted followers, public opinion ranges from "Tommy has been slightly hard done by", to "Tommy is a deluded egotist who brought this whole fiasco on himself."

His fellow inmates are more likely to gift him King of the Swingers-style nicknames than groceries; and there will almost inevitably be some unseemly jostling to secure and sell the first photograph of him to a newspaper.

In his prison diaries, Jeffrey Archer gave some insight into what it's like for a famous person to be incarcerated. "I smile when I am at my lowest, I laugh when I see no humour, I help others when I need help myself. I am alone," he wrote. "If I were to show any sign, even for a moment, of what I'm going through, I would have to read the details in some tabloid the following day. Everything I do is only a phone call away from a friendly journalist with an open cheque book."

Keeping Sheridan buoyed up will be the thought of forthcoming court action: his appeal against his perjury conviction; his case against the News of the World for breach of privacy (on the grounds that private investigator and phone hacker Glenn Mulcaire had Sheridan's mobile phone number, address and pin number) and his wife Gail's suing of Lothian and Borders Police over the release to the BBC of the couple's police interview tapes and the confiscation of Gail's rosary beads.

Last week's news that Andy Coulson, editor of the News if the World at the time of the phone hacking scandal and a key witness in Sheridan's perjury trial, has resigned as Downing Street spin doctor will have raised Sheridan's spirits and given legal proceedings fresh momentum.

Then there is Gail's forthcoming election campaign to think about: she has intimated that she will fly the flag for Solidarity by standing in the Scottish Parliament elections in May.

Set against all that, however, will be the News if the World's appeal against the libel judgment which triggered the perjury charges. If the newspaper wins, and court costs of up to 500,000 are awarded against Sheridan, he faces bankruptcy - a state that would put an end to any ambitions to return to Holyrood.

The irony that Sheridan's career as an elected politician - which began when he won the right to stand for parliament while in Saughton Prison in 1992 - should be killed off with his incarceration elsewhere will not be lost on him.

Worse still, if the News if the World wins its appeal within the next few months, there is a chance his wife and five-year-old daughter Gabrielle could be made homeless. Although Sheridan transferred the house into Gail's name within days of the libel trial beginning in July 2006, it takes a full five years for it to become protected from creditors.

Despite accepting he is going to be inside for a considerable amount of time, friends say Sheridan is remaining upbeat. "In some ways being in prison will be easier for Tommy than being in the Big Brother house," said one. "He has been in before and has always got on fine with the other inmates. He will probably end up as he did the last time as an unofficial welfare officer, raising gripes and answering letters for the other prisoners.

"If he has a weak spot, it's his need to be with Gabrielle. She's a daddy's girl and he will hate being separated from her - that could be a real problem for him."

When the prison van heads away from the High Court, trailing a stream of photographers in its wake, it is likely to make its way to Barlinnie. There, Sheridan will be physically and psychologically assessed, talked through his sentence and the prison rules, and allocated a 'first night' cell.

What happens next depends largely on the sentence he is given. If it is less than four years - regarded by the Scottish Prison Service as a short-term sentence - he may well stay in Barlinnie. If not he will be transferred to another prison - most likely Shotts or Glenochil depending on how full they are.

Trying to guess Sheridan's sentence has become something of a legal and journalistic parlour game since Sheridan's conviction in December, with the smart money on five years. In 1987, Archer was jailed for four years on two counts of perjury and attempting to pervert the course of justice after he asked a friend to give him a false alibi and produced fake diary entries, while Jonathan Aitken got just 18 months for lying over claims he was involved in a dodgy deals with leading Saudis, but these cases were in England and there have been no similar cases north of the Border.

One factor likely to influence Lord Bracadale is Sheridan's refusal to accept a "plea bargain" that would have seen him serve two years in exchange for admitting his guilt. "The common thinking is that if you turn down an offer like that you get at least double the specified sentence," one friend said. "But in Tommy's case the plea bargain was offered when he was facing 19 charges and he was eventually convicted of only five."

On the other hand, in Sheridan's case there were "aggravating" factors, in particular the trauma his former friends, his wife and the jurors were subjected to as a result of his determination to fight on.

"It is difficult because if the judge sets too high a sentence, what's going to happen the next time perjury results in something more serious such as a murderer going free?" one legal source said. "Yet, he has to set down a marker that what Sheridan has done is serious: he might well feel aggrieved that Sheridan has taken up 45 days of High Court time when he should have fallen on his sword."

Insisting on delivering his own plea in mitigation may do him no favours either as legal sources insist these carry more weight when delivered by a third party.

Wherever he ends up, Sheridan is likely to devote a lot of his jail time to working on the forthcoming legal cases. While access to his family will be confined to three visits a month, he can see his lawyer as often as he likes.

The veteran campaigner is convinced he will be granted leave to appeal. He has come up with three new witnesses who, he says, are prepared to testify they saw him at a socialist event in Glasgow the night he was supposed to be in the Manchester sex club.

With Coulson having resigned over the continuing controversy over phone hacking at the News if the World, which he strenuously denies he sanctioned, Sheridan may feel he is home and dry. But many in Scotland's legal circles are a little more sceptical. They point out that Sheridan can hardly accuse his defence of incompetence as he chose to represent himself, and suggest his claim that the judge was at fault for refusing to hear "crucial" evidence - such as the infamous testimony of former Radio Clyde comedian and impersonator Des McLean - is clutching at straws.

Sheridan's dream of becoming a lawyer (he started a two-year fast-track course) may have been scuppered by his conviction, but he could always continue his studies, either by making use of the teachers and lecturers who come into the jails or by correspondence course.

And there are other ways in which he could pass his time. He could, like Archer, write a book, though any proceeds made would have to go to charity. Or he could keep his blog up to date, although with no access to the internet he would have to post it out or hand it to visitors.

No doubt he will want to get involved in Gail's Scottish Parliament bid. The thought of her out on the campaign trail while he is languishing in a cell will no doubt be a source of frustration, particularly when he looks back nostalgically on the two elections he fought in Saughton. Yet some have questioned how beneficial his involvement would be. With so many of his former supporters believing he was probably guilty of at least some of the things he was accused of, would he help or hinder Gail's chances?

For the moment, at least, Sheridan is keeping his head below the parapet, a course of action which runs contrary to his nature. Indeed, having promised to say nothing until after sentencing, he couldn't stop himself logging on to his Facebook site on Christmas Day to confirm his intention to continue the fight against "the forces of darkness". After his sentencing, it is likely a pre-written message will be posted on his blog.

Far from feeling defeated, friends say, he and Gail see the prison sentence as an inevitable consequence of a life spent fighting the establishment. "Mr Sheridan has been a campaigner, a fighter and a socialist for more than two decades. He is very strong and resilient," his lawyer Aamer Anwar says.

With a longer sentence than he is used to, Sheridan need be in no rush to make his mark on prison life. He could take the time to reflect on everything that's happened. But then he's not prone to introspection.

If I know Tommy, it won't be long until he's in the thick of it," said one friend. "In no time at all, he'll be hammering on the governor's door to complain about some injustice or other."

The highs and lows of Sheridan's life

• Tommy Sheridan was born in March 1964, in Pollok, Glasgow, to Alice, a passionate trade unionist, and Tommy, who was president of the local football club Pollok United.

• He attended St Lourdes Secondary in nearby Cardonald - where he met his future wife Gail Healy - and then Stirling University where he studied economics and politics.

• While at Stirling University, he joined the left-wing group Militant, helping to form Scottish Militant Labour in 1989 after being expelled from the Labour Party in 1989.

• After being jailed in 1992 for six months for trying to stop a warrant sale, Sheridan fought two elections from Saughton Prison, Edinburgh.

• He took second place in Glasgow Pollok at the General Election. Weeks later he won the local council ward.

• In 1998, Sheridan played a key part in bringing together left-wing factions to form the Scottish Socialist Party. A year later he became their first MSP.

• He was jailed in 2000 for a fortnight, then in 2003 for a week for refusing to pay fines over protests at Faslane nuclear submarine base.

• He resigned as convener of the SSP when the News of the World ran stories claiming he had had affairs and attended a sex club in Manchester.

• In 2006, he sued the newspaper for libel and won 200,000 in damages. But the money was never paid because the paper lodged an appeal and the Sheridans were charged with perjury.

• Later the same year, he formed a new party, Solidarity.

• In 2009 he appeared on Celebrity Big Brother for a reported fee of 100,000.