Juggling chainsaws: A criminological fiction of a supervisory breach

Drawing upon my experience as a justice social worker within a Scottish local authority, the following text presents a fictionalised account of a supervisory breach. A routine feature of my job involved administering breaches for those subject to post-release supervision; a process which often saw those I supervised recalled to prison. Yet it is a role which I increasingly came to struggle with. Recognising that recall impresses further disadvantage upon already marginalised populations, my complicity in initiating this process, directed towards persons with whom I had generally established a relational bond, elicited an uncomfortable tension between my social work values and the institutional demands of risk management. Fiction provides an accessible medium whereby the interiorised struggles attendant within penal practice can be duly expressed. In writing this story, I have sought to capture the emotional and ethical complexities breach practice elicits – at least in my experience.