FURY AS TEEN YOBS GIVEN HAWIIAN PARTY BEHIND BARS - 3rd Jan 2009 1:06am
TEENAGE muggers, knife thugs and louts have been treated to a behind-bars Hawaiian party paid for by taxpayers.
Inmates were handed exotic treats and decorations for the bash at the Medway Secure Training Centre in Rochester, Kent – Britain’s first “child jail”.
The yobs, who cost £3,000 a week to lock up, enjoyed a weekend-long bash with coconuts, pineapples, hula hoops, bongos, limbo dancing and alcohol-free punch. Two inmates organised the party – which catered for Rochester’s 76 young offenders aged 12 to 17 – and were even given games including a Scalextric set.
A source at the centre said: “It’s unbelievable. They were getting into the swing of things and really going for it under the limbo pole.
“It looked more like the middle of Butlins in August than a rehabilitation centre. The victims of these offenders’ crimes would have stood there dumbfounded.
“There was very little in the way of remorse being shown.”
The party took place to mark the US holiday Hawaiian Flag Day. Details emerged this week in Government youth custody magazine Lockdown. which wrote: “To celebrate Hawaiian Flag Day (no really!) two young people in Medway STC were helped by a number of staff members to organise some fantastic events.
“There was even a bar in one unit (non-alcoholic of course)!”
One of organisers told the mag: “Aloha! I did this for my Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award, I can’t wait to set up another activity.”
The centre, which is run by private firm Rebound, was criticised soon after it opened in 1998 when at least a dozen disturbances took place within its first 12 months. Teens sent there have committed at least three imprisonable offences and breached a supervision order.
Inmates were handed exotic treats and decorations for the bash at the Medway Secure Training Centre in Rochester, Kent – Britain’s first “child jail”.
The yobs, who cost £3,000 a week to lock up, enjoyed a weekend-long bash with coconuts, pineapples, hula hoops, bongos, limbo dancing and alcohol-free punch. Two inmates organised the party – which catered for Rochester’s 76 young offenders aged 12 to 17 – and were even given games including a Scalextric set.
A source at the centre said: “It’s unbelievable. They were getting into the swing of things and really going for it under the limbo pole.
“It looked more like the middle of Butlins in August than a rehabilitation centre. The victims of these offenders’ crimes would have stood there dumbfounded.
“There was very little in the way of remorse being shown.”
The party took place to mark the US holiday Hawaiian Flag Day. Details emerged this week in Government youth custody magazine Lockdown. which wrote: “To celebrate Hawaiian Flag Day (no really!) two young people in Medway STC were helped by a number of staff members to organise some fantastic events.
“There was even a bar in one unit (non-alcoholic of course)!”
One of organisers told the mag: “Aloha! I did this for my Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award, I can’t wait to set up another activity.”
The centre, which is run by private firm Rebound, was criticised soon after it opened in 1998 when at least a dozen disturbances took place within its first 12 months. Teens sent there have committed at least three imprisonable offences and breached a supervision order.
