By Richard Spillett and Kevin Donald For Mailonline
Published: 15:28 BST, 4 April 2019 | Updated: 15:36 BST, 4 April 2019
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Prison warden Christopher Onslow has been jailed for leading a culture of beatings of bullying at a young offenders institute
Three prison officers who subjected vulnerable teenagers to beatings and abuse at a detention centre in 1970s and 1980s have been jailed for a total of 14 years.
Christopher Onslow, 73, John McGee, 75, and Kevin Blakeley, 67, led a brutal regime at Medomsley Detention Centre in County Durham, treating young inmates 'like animals'.
Judge Howard Crowson found that the 'culturally violent regime' at the centre was designed to 'crush the will' of terrified teenage inmates, rendering them powerless to complain or fight back.
The judge also launched a blistering attack on the code of silence that protected the men for almost 40 years.
He said: 'For many years, trainees from Medomsley Detention Centre shared a common sense of grievance. Many had experienced brutality at the hands of prison officers but nobody wanted to hear it.
'Those who had the courage to complain when they were released were either ignored or warned that to pursue the complaint would risk a return to Medomsley - and no one wanted to risk that.
John McGee and Kevin Blakely also took part in the abuse in the 1970s and 1980s
The judge told the men: 'You have all been protected for 40 years by that false view, by the fear of returning with which each trainee left Medomsley,
