PRISON REVEALS SHOCKING

A RECORD number of new prison officers are quitting as the zombie drug Spice and violent attacks sweep through jails.

At least 72 trainee warders left the service each month within weeks of completing their training, the Sunday People can reveal today.

One lasted only until his first lunch break, according to a whistleblower.

Neil Harrison, who has just left his job as a prison officer after 24 years, said: “It’s worse than ever. It’s like a war zone.”

More than 650 new prison staff on a starting salary of £ 22,000 quit before completing a year’s service last year.

Our most dangerous j ails are increasingly left in the hands of officers with less than three years’ experience.

Neil, 55, who quit after rising violence at HMP Risley, near Warrington, Cheshire, claimed one young recruit left within hours of beginning his first shift because he could not handle intimidation from prisoners.

And Neil told how convicts had targeted a female officer by throwing excrement in her face within two weeks of her joining the service.

Violent

Neil said: “There are these young kids coming in with no life experience and they’ve been told it’s a good opportunity at having a decent job.

“But they’ve been hoodwinked. They don’t realise the dangers they’re facing and they’re just leaving.

“One lad started on a Sunday morning and he had left by lunchtime. He never came back.”

Neil, from Wigan, Lancs, said drug debts behind bars were soaring, with inmates handing out violent beatings on those who owe up to £ 5,000 for the so-called zombie drug Spice.

And they are forcing inmates’ parents on the outside to set up bank accounts so they can transfer cash between criminals.

Neil struggled to cope with the scenes of horrific violence as well as the suicides and hangings.

He said: “I used to go to work excited. I was looking forward to what the day holds. But then they started making cuts and we lost control.

“It got to the point where I was in the car, driving in and I was getting anxious. It’s more like a war- zone than a prison.

“There’s a Spice epidemic which is