Reporters Jeremy James, Jeanne La Chard, John Pitman, Desmond Wilcox, Harold Williamson

This week: The Prisoner
What chance has John Booroof got? At 39, a petty criminal, he wanted, more than anything, to go straight. For five years he made it. He succeeded in putting behind him a lifetime of crime, 17 prison sentences served in 20 years. For the first time in his life he led what the prison authorities call 'a good and useful life.' He married a woman who had never had a wrong word with the police. They started a family, he found the kind of security and love he'd never known before.
Then he was back in prison again - where Man Alive met him. An experienced, embittered criminal. Later, outside prison, we met him again and watched him try to pick up the pieces of his family life. There are 40,000 men behind bars in this country today. John Booroof is one man who wanted to go straight. He is nearly middle-aged now. Harold Williamson asks: Can he make it?