Jacob Dunne - Right from Wrong: My Story of Guilt and Redemption

HarperNorth

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First published by HarperNorth in 2022

1 EDITION

Copyright Jacob Dunne 2022

Cover design Steve Leard

Jacob Dunne asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

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Source ISBN: 9780008472115

Ebook Edition May 2022 ISBN: 9780008472122

Version 2022-04-29

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For James

And for Jess, Xander and Tiggy

I want you to be in no doubt that the Meadows Estate, where I grew up and still lived until last year, is the permanent backdrop and the lens through which I have viewed the majority of my life up to and including now. The context for every grubby insight into the intricacies of low-level drug dealing, every skewed nuance of Nottingham gang culture and for every self-pitying recollection of what its like to suddenly find yourself in prison at the age of 19.

On some level, I hate the place. Part of me wants to forget the house on the corner of Bathley Street where I spent my childhood. I used to find little baggies of drugs on the pavement outside it as I walked to the bus stop to go to primary school. At the time I had no idea what they were. A few years later Id be dealing them by the ounce for money to buy clothes and booze.

Then there was the road to the side of our house where some nutjob set fire to a car during my ninth birthday party. The parents of my friends from a different (better) part of town looked on in a mixture of disbelief and horror when they came to pick up their kids. I can hardly blame them. The nine-year-old me was becoming accustomed to crime, and particularly the sound of early morning police raids on the street. Ten years later it would be my mums house being raided and I would be to blame.

Given everything Ive been through, the desire to leave The Meadows and forget about it has never really disappeared, and now Ive had a glimpse of what else there is. Recently, Ive been thinking of moving away escaping to a Victorian semi in another part of the city, with high ceilings and grand fireplaces. Or perhaps even further. Not everyone gets that chance.

But theres another side of me that I just cant deny. Its the part that acknowledges my heritage the environment that formed me, for better or worse. In some way I appreciate the desolate grey concrete, the underpasses that smell of piss, the lines of alcoholics outside the pub, and the corner at the end of our road where, even today as I take my kids for a walk, youll see teenage lads circling on pushbikes dealing drugs. And I have a lot of respect for the people who live in this place. There are plenty of people in more pain and stress than they can manage.

I like to think of them as broken souls, pulling each other further and further down into the abyss, not because they want to be there, but because they just dont know how to do anything else. Every other week I read about an assault, a stabbing or even a murder in The Meadows.

When I learn more about these stories, most of them are familiar. Ive heard them before from cellmates or friends who were in gangs or I have witnessed the same thing myself. There is no excuse for violence, drugs and murder. People who commit such acts should expect to face the judicial system, just like I did.

But that doesnt make them inhuman. The other day a drug dealer, noticing my son approaching on his bike, bent down to his level with a beaming grin on his face, not to offer him drugs, but to tell him how well he was doing learning to ride it. I couldnt help smiling as we walked away. Even in the hearts of drug dealers, you will find a code of human decency if you look hard enough.

Obviously, I completely relate to all of this. I I know full well how a few bad choices can lead to tragic circumstances. It is sad how attractive and appealing criminality can be when you have no direction and no hope only a festering disdain for a system that offered people like me nothing other than what they were born into: a substandard existence in an English housing estate whose inhabitants did nothing but perpetuate this fatalistic view of the world.

What about today?

Well, Im worlds apart from the person Im describing here, but that has taken this entire book to try and put into words. I had even less direction and hope after I was released from prison than before I went in. The Nottingham riots raged at the time, as if to mirror my own self-destruction. Post-prison me was such a shell of a young man, with raging resentment, newly learned insights into how to commit crime, and the more immediate problem of having nowhere to live. I could have easily headed back to my old haunts and rekindled toxic friendships.

But I didnt.

Instead I started to trust.

I trusted in the idea that by getting the education Id squandered, it would serve me well. I completely bought into the idea that Restorative Justice (RJ) a process of rehabilitation and reconciliation could not only offer great comfort to my victims family, but also help me repair myself. I trusted that by being responsible and doing the best, one day I could create the kind of nurturing family environment that I lacked. Ive never stopped trusting, and as much as I remind myself in low moments along the way that I still rely on the kindness of others, I feel that Ive got something to offer the world. I hope this book can help me say it.

I hadnt thought about much of my childhood until recently. In truth I struggle to remember as much as I would like to. Part of the reason that I chose to write a book now is to try and remember more of these happy times and to honour the rare precious memories that I am scared of forgetting for good.

The sad reality is that the story I tell publicly is predominantly focused on the tragic things I have experienced in my life and the one awful act I committed that ended someone elses.

I now feel like one of the elders in my family. Over the last few years, my mum, her twin sister and Nan have all passed away. I have been so busy trying to right wrongs of the world that I have hardly had a moment to honour these women who raised me. Each of them was important in their own way. All of them loved me dearly and showed it.