Chinnick tells of jail ordeal
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by Derren Hayes
• Freed lorry driver Mickey Chinnick spoke this week for the first time about his fouryear ordeal in a Turkish jail. In December 1992 Chinnick was sentenced to six-and-a-half years after 10kg of heroin was found in his truck.
He has protested his innocence throughout his ordeal.
Chinnick was on the return leg of a journey after dropping car parts in Istanbul when his vehicle was involved in an accident and had to go to a garage for repair. That night I went out for a few drinks and when I got back the police were there and had already impounded my vehicle." he says.
He was sent to Istanbul prison where he spent nearly three years in overcrowded and rat and cockroach-infested cells living off a diet of fish soup, beans and rice.
He says: "We were treated like animals-120 prisoners had to share two toilets which were holes in the ground. While 1 was there three inmates were shot by other prisoners. You were given nothing for free. ..you had to pay for blankets, clothes, bedding, pots and pans, dishes and spoons," he adds.
Early last year Chinnick was moved to a refurbished prison in Bilecik, 350km outside Istanbul, which was cleaner, had showers and hot water but no heating during winter.
He was told he would be released on probation in Max' 1996 but only on payment of a £4,000 fine. "I couldn't afford it so I resigned myself to staying for another year," he says.
Chinnick passed his time by exercising, playing chess, reading books, drawing and needlework. He says he missed driving and simple things like hot water, a modern toilet and a daily paper.
He was released on 9 January after a Catholic charity paid the fine after reading about his plight in a national newspaper. On arrival at Heathrow Airport he was met by his fiancee Danneke Neale who had battled for over a year to get his release.
Now he plans to get back into haulage as soon as he has recovered from an operation. "I think I've still got a few years of driving in me and I want to do international work, especially to China and eastern Europe," he says. "I see it as a new challenge. This could have happened anywhere. If you're a dri. ver it's the risk you take— there's nothing you can do about it."
Chinnick and Neale plan to marry—and to continue fighting for the release of other British drivers imprisoned in similar circumstances abroad.
"If we don't help them, who will?" asks Neale.