From inmate to intimate
Ex-con turned Onlyfans superstar Dale Egan gives a rare and raw insight into life in prison – the awful food, the pecking order, “useless” learning modules and the loneliness. Ever wanted to know what it’s really like inside the slammer? Read on
Bouncer turned porn star Dale Egan wakes up in his new room. It’s furnished with two small single beds, a television, a stainless steel toilet and a few books. He’s barely slept a wink and he’s “s--tting bricks”. It is Egan’s first day in prison at the Grafton Correctional Centre. He better get used to it because it’ll be his home for four-and-a-halfyears.
THE FIRST 24 HOURS
It is October 2015 and Egan, a once “scrawny teenager bullied relentlessly”, is a convicted criminal, having pleaded guilty to a violent, drug-fuelled home invasion.
He was charged with special aggravated break and enter and sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment.
The 25-year-old is coming off a courtroom hangover of “six valiums” and is about to face the jail yard – and its big, bad crooks – for the first time.
The only sound he hears is the clinking of a key to open his small jail cell. That 24 hours would be the scariest part of his sentence.
Even for someone with bulging, tattooed muscles and an imposing frame, he’s riddled with “gut-wrenching fear”, “uncertainty” and a labyrinth of “unanswered questions”.
“I instantly knew I had to adapt so I had this overwhelming feeling that if anyone started on me, I’d have to knock them the f--- out,” he tells the Bulletin of that moment.
“All I remember feeling was daggers in my heart over what I’d done and that I was in there.”
But Egan says prison is not always like the movies.
“I was instantly greeted by a supportive network of men who, like me, were all going through their own emotional pain.
“Of course, there’s some really bad people in there. But generally, people in jail have their own codes, beliefs and systems and it’s so much less chaotic than you’d think. Jail is a fineworking machine.”
Egan says a number of inmates approached him on the first day, asking him how he was and “supportive” in answering questions.
Some would become his “best mates”.
PRISON YARD POLITICS
“It is very rare to see someone get bashed in jail for no reason,” says Egan, a top-earning adult performer today banking close to $1m a year through Onlyfans.
“And if they are, the offenders are usually looked down on as bullies. The people responsible are usually not favoured within the group.”
Egan says the same rules applied for homosexuals.
“It’s not like the movies where you see a lot of prison rape culture or targeting of gays. They (homosexuals) usually make themselves known and are just as respected as anyone else.
“Jail sex, from what I saw, was an extremely rare thing.”
Egan also spoke about the politics in prison and the “judgment” prisoners faced from correctional officers.
“The correctional officers, workers, educators and guards, for the most part, aren’t a positive contribution to the whole reforming process.
“Some are bullies, look down on you and don’t really understand how we (prisoners) think or what we are going through.”
Egan said the learning modules in prison were “useless” and education on the inside “could be much better”.
“It’s not a one-size-fits-all. You have people in jail from all different backgrounds with different learning abilities.
“The best learning you can get while incarcerated is by looking at yourself in the mirror and working out how to find a way up from rock bottom. It’s all about self-growth and reflection.
“It wasn’t actually jail that fixed me. I fixed me. But despite that, prison is one of the best things that could’ve ever happened to me.”
MEAL TIMES
Egan is well-acquainted with prison food. In fact, he made the stuff.
One of his first jobs on the inside was manning the kitchen, where he’d prepare meals for hundreds of hungry prisoners.
He says the vegetarian ravioli option was “the worst thing” he’d ever put in his mouth. “It’s disgusting. I’d have to rate it a 1/10.” His favourite meal? The sausages and mash. “Prison food is exactly like you’d expect. It’s pretty f---ing awful.”
PUNISHMENT AND CHANGING JAILS
Egan is downward dogging in his small jail cell.
He starts each day with an hour of yoga and meditation.
Just over three years into his sentence he served a two-week isolation stint at South Coast Correctional Centre in Nowra for being caught with a mobile phone.
As punishment, he spent two weeks in what he called “the worst cell ever”, without television or books – and no-one to talk to.
He had been moved from Glen Innes Correctional Centre, a minimum security, “farm-style” jail, where the digs have “proper meat” (steak) and the telly has Foxtel.
After this stint, he would serve the rest of his sentence in Nowra’s maximum security wing, rubbing shoulders with some of the most hardened criminals in NSW.
But it’s not the first time he spent time in isolation.
Earlier in his sentence, he was allegedly caught smuggling in “supplements”. He declined to reveal further details.
“Generally, some things that happen in prison, stay in prison,” he says reluctantly.
Despite isolation time in the “cell from hell”, Egan says Nowra was his “favourite jail”.
“It was in Nowra I made a lot of close friends and also where I had a complete turnaround in my thinking.
“It’s also when I realised I never wanted to go back to jail. When I was in isolation I kept thinking ‘I’m better than this’.
“My mates and I had intelligent and lifechanging conversations and I read a lot of great business and self-help books. It all set me on the path to where I am today.”
The best learning you can get while incarcerated is by looking at yourself in the mirror and working out how to find a way up from rock bottom.
MENTAL STATE
The hardest part of jail, Egan says, is the “time lost”.
“You miss out on so much. I missed out on friends having kids, birthdays and spending time with my brothers.
“And, surprisingly, I missed basic intimacy like affection and cuddles over sex.”
Egan insists many men in jail aren’t “evil” and had “made mistakes, just like normal people”.
“You see some of the best dads in there. I’ve seen a lot of fathers on the outside who are s--and there’s some guys in jail who never stop talking about how much they love their kids.
“They were calling their kids every chance they could get and more often than not they
were in there for committing a crime in the pursuit of money for their families.”
Egan says jail taught him to be “less quick to judge” and gave him a sense of “compassion, patience and understanding” he couldn’t have learned “on the outside”.
When asked of his dreams in jail, Egan says: “You definitely dream of jail, while inside prison and outside. And also girls.”
When Egan was taken from the courtroom to the holding cells, he says his “serious” girlfriend at the time was “crying uncontrollably.”
It would be the last time he’d ever see or hear from her.
Just four-weeks into his sentence, she “ghosted” him, leaving Egan traumatised and “triggered” by the thought of future relationships.
“That hurt like a mother------. One Friday on a phone call she said ‘I love you, miss you and have a good weekend’ and, by the Monday, I never heard from her again.
“Even now it still brings up fears and pain for me.”
LIFE ON THE OUTSIDE
On the day Egan was released, in March 2020, the first thing he did was book a limo with some of his ex-con mates and headed straight for a luxury hotel on Darling Harbour in Sydney.
“It felt crazy being free for the first time in nearly five years.
“Everything was overwhelming. My senses and my brain went into overdrive.”
Egan says his friends helped to get him back on his feet financially.
He says it was that support that gave him the time to focus on setting up an Onlyfans account, from which now he banks close to $1m a year on and is one of the platform’s topearning stars.
ON THE CRIME
According to NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, crime rates in the State declined for a two year-period during the pandemic, but are back on the rise.
Around the pandemic’s height in April 2020, rates for violent crimes fell sharply.
However, “most violent offending, including domestic assault, non-domestic assault and robbery, has now returned to pre-pandemic levels,” a report stated.
During the pandemic, break and enters were down 16 per cent. A December 2021 report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics stated incarceration rates Australia-wide had reached their lowest level since early 2017.
The highest number of incarcerated persons was in NSW, with 12,188 persons in custody.
Onlyfans has yet to comment on convicted criminals performing on its platform.