“Female prison guards are much more respected than male guards”

“From my experience, I find that female prison guards are much more respected than male guards.” Shérazade (alias) is a prison guard at the Nanterre remand center in Hauts-de-Seine. The inmates are all men. Shérazade is one of the sixty women who have been walking the corridors of the remand center for five years. “There is not this ‘strength relationship’ between the prisoners and the male guards. The firmness of a speech is worth more than the firmness of the muscles.”

Shérazade meets the prisoners every day. “We talk a lot with them, there are a lot of them who open up to us, who tell us about their worries.she explains.

“It’s quite paradoxical in the sense that they tell us everything and we really tell them nothing about our life.”

Sherazade, prison warden

at franceinfo

In five years of activity, Shérazade has only been assaulted once. “An inmate doused me with soap and water for no reason.she recalls. I think he was a little psychologically fragile person, maybe it was a cry for help.”

Shérazade remembers a grandmother who came to see her grandson for the first time. “She burst into tears the minute she saw him.she recalls. It touched me. So at the end of the visit, I tried to reassure her. She thanked me very much. You still have to have a bit of humanity because it’s still not an easy job.”

“Essentials”, a franceinfo podcast by Salhia Brakhlia, to be found on the franceinfo website, the Radio France application and several other platforms such as Apple podcasts, Podcast Addict, Spotify, or Deezer.