Episode
Prisoner: Episode 171
Overview
Graeme Hopkins arrives at Wentworth threatening to expose the contents of Judy's tape if Erica won't agree to grant him an interview. Helen Smart comes home to find Judy waiting for her: after a bit of persuasion (and a wad of banknotes to cover her lost "business") she agrees to let Judy stay for a while, but she is slightly worried when Judy vows that she intends to avenge herself on Gillespie and Jock Stewart. Erica warns Graeme Hopkins that his campaign to free Lizzie could kill her, but she agrees to let him talk to her so she can hear it in Lizzie's own words. At first, Lizzie says she does want to get out of prison, but when Hopkins tells her he can't help her get a visa, she turns on him and says she doesn't want his help. Helen is sceptical about Judy's enthusiasm when she finds out her tape is to be shown on TV after all, saying the police won't act on the word of a criminal alone.
Details
- Series
- Prisoner
- Season
- Season 3
- Episode
- Episode 6
- Air date
- 1981-02-24
- Runtime
- 47 min
Episode context
Episode 171 is Episode 6 in Season 3 of Prisoner. It aired on 1981-02-24. The runtime is 47 min.
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Episode 5: Episode 170
Wally tells Judy he's concerned that Micki is getting too involved in Judy's campaign to improve conditions, and Judy agrees to talk to Micki. Erica tells Meg that Lizzie won't be able to get a visa to enter the United States with a criminal record. Meg tells the women to humour Lizzie's plans to emigrate until she is fully recovered. Wally tries to warn Micki of the risks she's running, and when Judy sees she is not convinced, she tells Micki that she won't do the interview. Doreen gets two years for escaping and three months for the kidnapping. News of Lizzie being returned to Wentworth persuades Judy to do the interview after all, and Judy suggests that the tape could be posted to the TV station, but Micki wants to hand it to Graeme Hopkins in person. Erica visits Lizzie in hospital and asks the doctor the effect of telling her truth about America: he advises against it, and Erica thinks it best he just tells Lizzie she isn't strong enough to travel.
Episode 7: Episode 172
Jock tells Judy she's now going to work for him: he wants $300 every time he visits - if not, he'll bash her and turn both Judy and Helen over to the police. Doreen is noticeably more enthusiastic about the classes than the other women. After leaving the massage parlour after a hard night's work, Judy has to fend off a kerb crawler and ends up being chased by two patrolcar policemen. Helen suggests that Judy should go away somewhere quiet, but Judy says she wants to get Jock in her own way, no matter how many men she has to go with. Only Doreen turns up for David's classes. Jim tells Sid he ought to make a list of his tools so he knows if any of them go missing. Judy goes back to work at the massage parlour , and when Jock comes to collect his money he hits her across the face when she says she hasn't got it yet. He suggests that if business is slow she ought to offer something more than "a gentle rub-down".
More episodes from this season
Episode 4: Episode 169
Vera gives Lizzie mouth-to-mouth resuscitation while the women wait for the ambulance to arrive. Meanwhile, Hazel removes the bucket of booze from the store room behind Vera's back. Ted Douglas tells Erica a teacher will be appointed to a new education facility in the prison. Vera feels guilty that she didn't believe Lizzie at first, but she recovers her usual character in time and remembers about the grog manufacture, which she rushes off to investigate. When she gets to the rec room, the buckets have vanished but Vera tells Bea she must have known what was going on and must see the Governor. In hospital, Lizzie describes her near-death experience to a doctor in the usual cliched terms involving bright lights at the end of a tunnel. Vera takes Bea to the Governor to explain what she knows about the home brew, and Bea is honest for once: she tells Erica the home brew has been flushed down the toilet.
Episode 8: Episode 173
Doreen tries to take the blame as Jim returns her to her cell, but he obviously doesn't believe her. Bea and Lizzie are both in favour of letting David take the blame. Next morning, Jim reports what he saw to Erica, and says he doesn't think Doreen should be held entirely responsible. Erica orders David that he can no longer speak to Doreen if she's on her own, and suggests that he tries to interest more women in his classes. Bea tells Doreen not to waste time mooning over David, as she'll never get anywhere. Sid asks to drive Meg and Lizzie to hospital, but Meg agrees only if he will keep it quiet. Vera accuses David of seducing Doreen, and her tone carries more than a hint of the spite she feels because it wasn't her. Bea snaps and tells Doreen she's had enough of her always going on about David. David starts to approach the women individually about his classes, but Hazel tells him she isn't much interested after her bad experiences at school.
Episode 3: Episode 168
Wally tells Judy he saw her photo in the newspaper, but tells her he has no intention of telling the police where she is, inviting her to stay as long as he likes. He is surprised when she turns down the offer of "a smoke", so Judy offers to explain why she is so opposed to drugs by telling him her story. Lizzie and Doreen are allowed out of sickbay. The women are delighted by the TV news that Judy is still on the run: Gillespie is annoyed and wants to have TV and radio privileges taken away. Erica tells him she will only agree to have the newspapers censored. Bea regrets that Anne has been transferred to a psychiatric hospital before she had the chance to fix her. Gillespie tells Vera to censor the papers but cuts her down to size when she suggests his own idea about TV and radio. Judy is disappointed that the letter she left in her cell hasn't been mentioned in the newspapers and is inspired by Wally's' suggestion that she writes to the Ombudsman.
Episode 9: Episode 174
Bea orders the women to send Sandra to Coventry so she can't get any more information. Judy overhears Sandra ask Jim to be allowed to make a phone call and using considerable knowledge of regulations to get her own way. Doreen borrows Bea's torch so she can finish knitting the socks after light out. Doreen breaks the no talking to Sandra ban to ask her if she'll agree to go top classes with her, and she manages to give David his present. However, Erica comes in to the library to see how classes are going and David hides the socks on the bookshelves. Bea and Doreen try to cheer Judy up by saying she did the right thing for all of them while she was on the outside. David shows Vera the socks and she comments acidly that he ought to start knitting classes. When she next sees Doreen she can't resist making a snide comment which makes Doreen run back to her cell. Bea and Lizzie find her in tears and decide to attend the classes to settle the score.
Episode 2: Episode 167
Jim overhears Mouse and Margo discussing the escape and what might have happened to Doreen and Bea, and Irene's death in the cave-in. Anne is also listening as they pass her cell and she assumes that it's Bea who is dead. Mouse agrees to show the officers where the tunnel is, but Gillespie nevertheless orders that she loses remission. Lizzie uses a piece of her costume tied round a stick as a torch, but Bea grabs hold of it and rushes off down the tunnel. Chrissie asks Gillespie for permission to hold a first birthday party for Elizabeth: he refuses and says he will make sure that child welfare are informed and come to collect Elizabeth promptly when she is one year old. Mouse leads the officers to where Lizzie and Doreen are. Anne is told that Dr Weissman may want to see her again after he's interviewed her family. Bea is eventually found banging her hands on a security grille trying to get through.
Episode 10: Episode 175
Bea tells the women they can use Sandra to feed her information which supports their cause. Meg gives Lizzie the news that Sid has had a stroke, and promises to ask permission for her to visit him in hospital. Sandra says she's willing to pay the women for information, but only if it's what she thinks her editor will want. Three new prisoners are brought to Wentworth: when the van door is opened, one of them, Jenny Armstrong, has been given a bloody nose by one of the others, Georgie Baxter. Jenny is in prison for not paying a parking fine. Georgie is manhandled shrieking into reception and after wiping the fingerprint ink all over Jim's face , she is sent straight to solitary . When she is left alone there, she tears up the uniform she is supposed to put on. Meg introduces the third new inmate, Evelyn Randall, to the women in the rec room. Sandra complains the stuff the women are telling her is too boring to print.
Episode 1: Episode 166
Judy and Mouse dig in the rubble with their bare hands, but they only turn up Irene's dead body . They shout for help and hear Bea's voice on the other side of the cave-in: Bea tells them that Doreen and Lizzie are still alive. Meanwhile, Anne is making a rockery on top of the tunnel, but Gillespie sees her and sends her back inside the marquee. Bea has to help Doreen free her leg , but she still isn't able to walk, so Bea goes back alone to try to get help. Margo and Hazel are worried that Bea and Lizzie haven't come back , especially when Vera notices that Bea isn't around, but Margo manages to cover for her. Bea reaches the entrance to the tunnel but can't get the lid up. Gillespie notices the ladder and raises the alarm: all the kids are sent home.
Episode 11: Episode 176
Bea dashes off to make Evelyn reveal what was in the the mixture she gave Doreen. When Evelyn finds out that Doreen heated up the mixture, making it toxic, she says she can take no responsibility if people ignore her instructions - just as her unfortunate patient who died had done, by eating the preparation for skin cancer that was supposed to be an ointment. David offers to talk to Georgie when she is released from solitary later that day. Doreen is soon back to normal and both she and Lizzie apologise to Evelyn, much to Bea's disgust. Evelyn is worried when she finds out that Sandra is in isolation, and won't be able to write the article to help her case, but Judy suggests it would be just as good if she could cure some illness while inside prison, such as the rare tropical illness they've just heard about: Evelyn points out that none of them seem to be suffering from it.
Episode 12: Episode 177
A doctor arrives to carry out tests for tropical diseases: Evelyn scoffs at him from her bed in the infirmary. Dr Granger warns Erica that if Sally was the contact there could be an epidemic. No-one can explain how Lizzie became infected until Jim remembers that she'd brought Sally a meal when she was in sickbay. Georgie is forcibly removed from solitary for an examination and an injection of antibiotics. Dr Granger suspects typhoid and orders all food in the kitchen to be destroyed and that block H should be isolated from the rest of the prison. He also tells the officers they won't be allowed to go home. Judy reports back to Bea that she wasn't allowed to get out of the block to go to the library. Evelyn challenges the nurse, claiming that she could cure herself and refusing the injection. Sandra is moved out of isolation to make room for the female officers: when she finds out about the quarantine she begs Vera not to put her back with the other women. Georgie is put in Judy's cell.
Episode 13: Episode 178
Sandra is persuaded to come back inside. Evelyn seems worried that her medicine isn't working on Meg. Sandra is told she could be charged with attempting to escape: Erica tells her she will he sent to solitary (with an aside to Jim that the male officers will now have to bed down in the interview room) and warns her against an escalating cycle of ever more serious charges that could make her stay in Wentworth permanent. Doreen overhears that Meg is getting worse and recovers what's left of the medicine from Evelyn's cell and flushes it away in the shower block. Georgie checks up on Judy, but is told to look after Bea, who seems to be in a much worse condition. Erica suggests to Dr Granger that the epidemic may be non-bacterial as the antibiotics seem to be having little effect. Evelyn points out to Lizzie that Meg seems much better, and indeed she comes out of her coma.