“Behind the walls”, testimony of 38 years spent in the prison administration

What happens behind prison walls?* Only those who live there can truly tell. Didier Duchiron grew up on a farm in Cromac, in the north of Haute-Vienne. The vagaries of life – and a weak eye – decided his future. He spent 38 years in prison, on the right side of the bars.
Now almost retired, he recounts his experience as head of detention at the Saint-Maur central house in Behind the walls. A book some parts of which could inspire novels or series.

The central house of Saint-Maur, in Indre, was Didier Duchiron’s intended assignment upon leaving his training. Considered the most secure prison in France, it accommodates figures of organized crime and prisoners who have been sentenced to heavy sentences.

Hostage taking, mutiny, radicalization of detainees, death threats, incidents of all kinds: the worst is in detention. The best can also be found there: workshops are created to allow prisoners to have an activity and remuneration, prisoners “escape” or cultivate themselves thanks to the library, a supervised hike around the nearby lake is a welcome outing…

Through Behind the wallswe understand that being a prison guard is not necessarily quite what we imagine. It’s not just about opening and closing gates or monitoring the exercise yard. We realize that a relatively calm atmosphere is sometimes due to simple manifestations of humanity, while certain decisions can trigger violent demonstrations.

Behind the Walls is not a plea, it is a testimony. Didier Duchiron endeavored to depict certain episodes – things happened during 38 years of detention.

Throughout the pages, we find names that made the headlines in the media at different times. Pierre Albertini, figure of the FLNC (Corsican National Liberation Front), Marcel Barbeault, nicknamed by the press the “Shadow Killer”, Jean-Claude Romand the fake doctor, Carlos the terrorist and many others. The author recounts the relationships, good or bad, that he maintained with everyone, humanity, inhumanity, violence and compassion, the need to be uncompromising in certain situations such as taking into account the man in front.

Didier Duchiron left office in 2020, but he has not completely left the prison environment. It is part of the prison administration’s operational reserve, responsible for fitting and monitoring electronic bracelets for people benefiting from an alternative measure to imprisonment. A way to continue his “very beautiful profession”.

The term prison is a generic term which covers different structures. Remand centers, detention centers and central prisons do not accommodate the same type of detainees and the conditions of detention are not the same. Prison centers are establishments which accommodate two types of structures on the same site.

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