[RETUR NO DES 988500 REE PHOTO:J.M.B.HARRIS A young…]

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RETUR NO DES 988500 REE PHOTO:J.M.B.HARRIS A young worker jailed in the Midlands tells how the rioters were 'welcomed as heroes' by the Borstal kids FOR THE 'crime' of walking the streets after 11 o' clock on a Saturday night, I was thrown into a police van, beaten up, thrown in a police station cell for two days, and then off to Borstal for seven days' remand.

Of course, I wasn't the only one in that position. In the Borstal there were rioters from all over the country, 60 from Leicester, 120 from Liverpool and Moss Side, 30 from Birmingham, and many more.

Usually when you go into Borstal you have to compete with the other kids in order to get through your term. But in the words of the screws, we were 'treated like heroes' by the others in the Borstal.

Many of the youth said they would have joined us outside. They could see they were all in the same boat against the police.

Something that surprised me was the amount of support inside for the H-Block hunger strikers.

H-Block

When we were locked up on the first night, there were chants of 'Smash HBlocks' ', which lots of youth joined in.

There were some skinheads in there who said they were National Front and British Movement, but they weren't too keen to discuss their politics among the West Indian and Asian youth in there.

They all put down on the legal aid from that they wanted Reed-Herbert [the British Democratic Party leader recently exposed on 'World in Action' as a Nazi gun-runner| to represent them in court.

They had a shock when, of course, he never showed up. Instead he, like other fascists, will be calling for the jailing of rioters along with the repatriation of blacks.

This certainly made them

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me for Tory crimes