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Article: 'Kevin was he no angel but he didn't deserve to die' When 17-year-old Kevin Henson died in September, he was just the latest suicide in Britain's most scandal-ridden young offenders' centre - at Feltham, west London. EMILY SHEFFIELD traces what went wrong in his short, violent and depressing life
- Article from:
- The Evening Standard (London, England)
- Article date:
- November 10, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2000 Evening Standard - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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SOME of Kevin's last words survived. In his final letter to his
father, he wrote: "I shouldn't be punished like this; I need to be
helped ..."
And on the night he hanged himself in his cell, he scribbled notes
and stuck them all over the walls with toothpaste. "On each one,"
says his father, his voice barely audible, "he'd written: 'I want to
be with my mum'."
In fact, Kevin's mother had died of cancer on his 14th birthday
and, according to his half-sister, Natasha, this is what triggered
the descent into drugs, alcoholism and crime which finally led him
into Feltham.
He couldn't have finished up in a worse place. Feltham is
Britain's largest youth offenders' institution.
Conditions ...