Like other newspapers, The Argus occasionally publishes correspondence bemoaning the failure of prison to address criminal behaviour (Letters, September 3) but, in my own eye-opening experience, the fault should also be attributed elsewhere.

I was released from jail on August 10 after 18 months. My incarceration was frightening because I shared a cell with, among others, a man who had killed his own mother, a paedophile and an inmate subject to a section under the Mental Health Act who had cut his arm so deeply the limb was useless.

As a result, I returned to the real world resolved to change but I face impossible obstacles. Rather than survive on welfare payments, I want to work but, at the time of my release, I had only one set of clothes and shoes that were nearly falling off my feet.

Four weeks later, I still have only one set of clothes which, of course, I cannot wash because I have nothing else to wear. Going out in public is becoming embarrassing and the effects, both physical and mental, are distressing. I applied for a Community Care Grant to buy clothing. The Benefits Agency in Edward Street turned me down on the basis I did not meet its criteria for a grant, one of which is that grants are given to people released from prison.

Prison does work for some of us. I would rather die than go back inside. But, faced with such circumstances, which are at best ludicrous and at worst demoralising and unhygienic, is it any wonder so many offenders return to crime so soon?

The system, like my clothes, stinks.

-Stephen, Grand Parade, Brighton