These past days I’ve found myself working with the Administration Penitentiare (Prison Administration) in Luxembourg. Ahead of my visit I shared with friends that I was working in a prison. It was clear most jumped to the assumption that my focus was on inmates. Many were surprised when I said it wasn’t. My focus was with staff.
Prisons across the world are high risk and dangerous places to live and work. What happens in prisons really matters. A safe prison culture helps everyone. Inmates, and staff clearly benefit from a healthy and happy environment. Wider society also benefits. When people leave prison after serving their sentence its important, they are properly supported to reintegrate back into wider society. When this fails further offending is highly probable. In fact, in many cases, it’s inevitable.
During the trip I with my colleague were given a guided tour of the prison facility by the deputy director of the prison. As former police officer I’ve visited and worked in many prisons. I always have the same feeling when inside. I have feelings of discomfort. It’s not discomfort from fear more I recognise that I’m entering someone else’s life space. You feel the tension as soon as you enter a prison. You are being watched, judged and discussed from the very moment you enter. I would suggest that you may be talked about after you leave.
I gained another perspective during that visit. I purposely imagined what it was like to work in a prison environment. My engagement with staff over the three days of training had started my curiosity however the visit cemented that. I saw risk potential risk everywhere. Remember prisons accommodate not just people who have broken the law, they provide lodgings to some of the most unpredictable and traumatised human beings in our communities. A peaceful moment can flip like a switch. Alarms will break the peace and silence. A simple disagreement between inmates will lead to violence. The ‘Convict (prison) Code is an informal, inmate defined set of values and norms that governs behaviours behind bars, typically standing in opposition to the authority of the prison system.
- Never Snitch (“Don’t rat on a con”):
- Mind Your Own Business (“Do your own time”):
- Be Tough (“Don’t weaken”):
- Never Trust or Be Friendly with Staff (“Don’t be a sucker
- Be Right “Be loyal to your class”
In a prison these set of rules impact negatively on inmates and staff alike. A prolonged exposure to extreme and unpredictable stress is good for no human being. In such a stressed state human beings quickly become dis-regulated. They are hyper-vigilant and will overreact to even the mildest of stimuli. Sleep patterns will suffer. Anger and frustration will be taken from work to the home. Depression and anxiety are highly likely and a dependence upon alcohol and drugs often follows.
In prison settings officers reported higher rates of suicidal thoughts, plans, and attempts. (Fusco et al, 2021).
Jaegers et al (2020) found that officers with higher levels of burnout experienced higher levels of depression and work-family conflicts.
Guardiano et al (2022) found that prison nurses had significantly longer work hours, higher pandemic-related work demands, and less sleep hours than community nurses.
During my trip I watched staff escorting inmates from a wing to the education block. I saw inmates using the gym facilities with guards close by. I was told about how inmates are received on their arrival. I saw risk everywhere. It was clear that staff were never alone with other staff nearby in support. However, I know that reliance on other human beings comes with risk also. You may have backup, but do you really have backup. The science of active bystandership highlights a range of environmental, social and physiological inhibitors that prevent action, even when others are present in supportive roles.
I found the tour of the prison useful. It helped me better apply my work to the setting. Importantly it highlighted the role that active bystandership will play in such a high risk and stressful environment.
Past Events
The death of Allan Marshall in HMP Edinburgh in 2015 will forever be haunted by the simple fact that Allan wouldn’t have died if only one member of the group present had intervened. As someone who has been fascinated by bystander behaviour for many years, I’ve followed this case since it became clear to me that Allan’s death was totally preventable. Many prison staff were present, were in a position to interrupt their fellow officer’s behaviour and save Allan’s life. But none did. Why was that? Maybe they saw no harm, maybe they assumed that the officers were in control and knew what they were doing. Did some see harm, intentional or otherwise and feel unable to act in the moment? What dynamics between the staff played out that day? What hierarchies were present? A man died that day. Surely any training and awareness to prevent that would be good.
The deaths of people in custody are always more than individual tragedies. They ripple outward, through families, communities, and the institutions tasked with care and control. In Scotland, cases such as the death of Allan Marshall and concerns around suicides in HM Young Offenders Institution Polmont, force difficult but necessary questions: not just about what went wrong, but about what cultures allowed those failures to persist.
One lens that offers both clarity and practical hope is active bystandership.
Moving from silence to responsibility
Traditional institutional cultures, particularly in justice, policing, and custodial environments, have often been shaped by hierarchy, loyalty, and risk aversion. These can unintentionally create conditions where people see warning signs but don’t act on them. Not because they don’t care, but because they are unsure, afraid, or assume someone else will step in.
Active bystandership challenges these rules. It reframes responsibility, not as something that sits only with leaders or specialists, but as something shared by everyone. In environments like prisons, this shift is critical. Staff, peers, healthcare workers, and even visitors all occupy positions where they may notice subtle changes, withdrawal, distress, conflict escalation, before they become crises. If even one person feels empowered to act early, outcomes can change. Small actions before crisis matter.
Recognising the “moments before”
Deaths in custody are rarely the result of a single moment. They are usually preceded by a series of smaller, often overlooked signals. A missed conversation. A dismissed concern. A pattern that didn’t quite reach the threshold for formal action.
Active bystandership builds the skill of noticing these “moments before.” It trains individuals to trust their instincts when something feels off and gives them practical tools to intervene safely and proportionately. The skill of active bystandership switches staff on at the earliest sign of harm. A raise in a person’s heart rate is a form of free alarm system provided by our evolution as humans. When we ‘know this, it’s hard to unknow it’.
In a place like Polmont, where young people may already be vulnerable, this is particularly important. Emotional distress does not always present clearly. It may show up as anger, silence, or rule-breaking. A culture of active bystandership encourages curiosity over judgement, asking “what’s going on here?” rather than immediately resorting to discipline or disengagement.
Challenging harmful norms
One of the most powerful barriers to intervention is the weight of perceived norms. If staff believe that speaking up will be seen as overreacting, disloyal, or naïve, they are less likely to act. The same applies to those in custody, peer cultures, the ‘Convict Code’ can discourage the showing vulnerability or seeking help. Active bystandership directly addresses this by exposing the gap between what people privately believe and what they assume others believe. Often, individuals are more concerned about safety and wellbeing than they think their peers are. Making this visible can shift group norms.
In practical terms, this might mean normalising simple acts: checking in on someone who seems withdrawn, questioning dismissive language, or raising concerns about procedures that don’t feel right. Over time, these small actions accumulate, reshaping what is seen as “normal” behaviour.
Creating psychological safety in high-risk environments
For bystandership to work, people need to believe they can act without negative consequences. This is where leadership and institutional design matter. Psychological safety is not about removing accountability, it is about ensuring that raising concerns is met with openness rather than defensiveness. In custodial settings, this can be challenging. The stakes are high, and decisions often carry legal and operational weight. However, without psychological safety, silence becomes the default. Silence, in these contexts, can be deadly.
Embedding active bystandership means creating clear pathways for raising concerns, ensuring those concerns are taken seriously, and visibly acting on them. It also means recognising and reinforcing positive interventions, making examples of when speaking up prevented harm.
Many continue to see bystander type training as action at moment of crisis. Delivered correctly it’s a tool to help ‘co-create’ a healthy and supportive culture where people act way before the crisis. When people act, everyone benefits.
From compliance to care
Many institutions rely heavily on procedures, checklists, and compliance mechanisms to manage risk. I discuss above the presence of staff as back up. This will be a requirement, a process. Whilst essential, they have limits. They cannot account for every human nuance, nor can they replace genuine human connection. Typical responses after fatal accident inquiries often lead to new training or updated processes. Whilst these are important they should not be relied upon. Active bystandership complements formal systems by bringing the human element back into focus. It encourages people to go beyond “ticking the box” and to engage with the individuals in their care as people, not just cases.
In the context of suicides, this is particularly significant. Research consistently shows that connection, feeling seen, heard, and valued, can be a protective factor. A brief, genuine interaction at the right moment can interrupt a downward spiral. Active bystandership equips individuals to create those moments. Clearly in these cases earliest is always best.
Reducing diffusion of responsibility
In complex environments, responsibility can become diluted. When many people are involved, it is easy to assume that someone else is better placed to act. This is known as diffusion of responsibility, and it is a well-documented barrier to intervention.
Active bystandership tackles this directly. It reinforces a simple but powerful idea: if you notice something, you have a role to play. That role may be small, starting a conversation, passing on information, or seeking guidance, but it matters.
In cases like Allan Marshall’s, public scrutiny often reveals multiple points where intervention might have been possible. Active bystandership does not eliminate the possibility of failure, but it increases the number of opportunities to prevent it.
Empowering those with least formal power
One of the strengths of active bystandership is that it does not rely solely on authority. In fact, it often empowers those with the least formal power, junior staff, peers, or individuals in custody themselves.
Even working with inmates can help. This is particularly relevant in young offender institutions. Peer influence is significant, and young people are often the first to notice changes in each other’s behaviour. Training and supporting them to act safely, whether by checking in, alerting staff, or challenging harmful dynamics, can be a powerful protective factor.
Of course, this must be done carefully, with clear boundaries and support systems. But ignoring the potential of peer intervention means overlooking a critical layer of prevention.
Turning learning into action
Investigations into deaths in custody often produce detailed recommendations. Yet, without cultural change, these recommendations can struggle to translate into everyday practice. Active bystandership bridges this gap. It operationalises learning by embedding it into daily behaviour. Rather than relying solely on policy updates, it focuses on what people actually do in real situations.
This includes rehearsing interventions, discussing scenarios, and building confidence through practice. The aim is not perfection, but progress, creating a workforce and community that is more willing and able to act.
A shift in identity
Ultimately, active bystandership is about identity as much as it is about behaviour. It asks individuals to see themselves not just as employees, officers, or inmates, but as people who have a role in protecting others.
In high-risk environments, this shift can be transformative. It moves the culture from one of passive observation to active care. From “it’s not my job” to “I can do something.”
Small actions, profound impact
The deaths of individuals like Allan Marshall and the ongoing concerns around suicides in Polmont demand more than procedural fixes. They require a cultural response, one that acknowledges the complexity of these environments while refusing to accept preventable harm as inevitable.
Active bystandership offers a practical and human-centred approach to that challenge. It does not promise to eliminate risk entirely, but it does increase the chances that someone, somewhere, will notice, care, and act. In settings where lives can hinge on small moments, that can make all the difference.
In prisons, staff train for the physical aspects of their role. What about the mental or extreme emotional stress. Do staff train for that? Active bystandership makes sure staff are prepared to deal with all the risks associated with this role.
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