Strangeways

First in a series of two documentaries about Britain's Notorious Prisons.

Using first-hand testimony from past inmates and staff, this episode describes how Manchester's Strangeways became one of the UK's most notorious jails.

A high security prison, Strangeways has housed some of the country's most dangerous convicts - including serial killers Ian Brady and Harold Shipman.

The prison was also infamous in the past for its Dickensian and degrading conditions, including overcrowding (three to a cell designed for one) and the practice of slopping out, where a bucket in each cell was shared as a toilet, and then emptied out in sluices with unsanitary consequences.

The programme shines a light on the 1990 riot, which decimated the prison as inmates took over for 25 days, as well as scandalous tales of prison officer behaviour and the overt racism which took place behind the prison walls in the seventies and eighties.