Night 1 of the curfew was Weds 28th, the day of my conviction.

Horseferry Road Magistrates’ Court is an unhappy old building. Sad yellow walls, stairs like a 1970s leisure centre in Purgatory. Lots of brooding, broken people sitting around in the reception area, barely held together by their tracksuits. The only people in suits apart from me seemed to be lawyers. This is the pettier, half-arsed end of the legal system.

The courtroom turned out to be a drab, open-plan affair. Long tables and chairs, a coat of arms on the wall. Not even a proper dock. It was never explained to me who did what, why there was one man seated at right angles immediately in front of the three magistrates (the clerk of the court?), and another tucked towards the back of the room taking notes. No names of the magistrates, no names at all.

Myself, Charlie M – taking time out of her job to give me moral support – and my legal aid lawyer, Ms Malik from Hodge Jones Allen, entered in time to catch the end of the case before mine.

Which wasn’t going well. A red-faced fifty-something man – I saw him as a Del Boy-style stall holder – was shouting at the three magistrates. ‘I can’t pay the fine. You’ve already taken my stock. This is LEGALISED THEFT. You’re all THIEVES’.

Then he turned around and shouted directly at each person in the room. Including his own lawyer, and even me.

‘I DON’T CARE WHAT YOU SAY! THEY’RE ALL THIEVES. THIEVES, I TELL YOU!’

He had to be asked to leave several times.

As I looked at the trio of magistrates, I noticed that the man in the middle did all the talking, while the two women flanking him remained silent. I kept thinking of the day Orlando had to play a special mini-gig in an expensive rehearsal room, the type used for industry showcases. It was solely for the producer of Jools Holland’s ‘Later’. I’ve always resented the way success in music – like in all the arts – depends on fitting the tastes of a small but powerful group of critics, festival bookers, and TV & radio producers. Never mind the passionate letters from lonely teens in Leicester saying your album saved their life; if Jools’s producer doesn’t like you, you’re going down (the dumper).

Like the magistrate, the male producer came flanked with two silent females (possibly co-producers) and sat on a sofa to watch us play a few numbers. We were never invited on the show. In terms of one’s music career, it felt like receiving a court sentence. Or possibly a thumbs down in a Roman arena. Shame. I was rather looking forward to the boogie-woogie piano jam.

My sole contribution to the court proceedings was to stand up and give my name, address, and plea of guilty. Ms Malik did all the rest of the talking on my behalf.

‘This is a contrite young man…’ she said at one point. I was rather pleased with the ‘young’.

She appealed to them to give me a conditional discharge, but after consulting among themselves (a matter of 2 minutes), the magistrates said the amount of the overpayment made that impossible. So I got the curfew and the tag.

After the session, I wandered around Soho in a daze. I called my parents from the Coach & Horses. They were sitting by the phone with their stomachs in knots, of course. I’m not proud.

I considered keeping the whole thing a secret and inventing an excuse for not being able to attend my own club night on August 4th. But I soon ditched that idea as unworkable: far easier to just be honest. So the last few days I’ve been repeating the same words to shocked friends. I’m not quite bored with it all yet, but it’s getting there.

Night 1: Consolatory drinks at the Arts Club with Charlie M and her friends. No tag, but best not to risk it. Back home by nine. Typing up the same answers again and again to people on Facebook. Feels like coming out: you have to keep telling people until everyone you’ve ever known knows. At least Joe off the X Factor does it on the front page of the Sun. Maybe I should just take out an ad in Court Circulars.

Night 2: Thursday. Emma Jackson’s birthday drinks at the Flask in Highgate. Try hard to not make the inevitable answer to ‘What have you been up to lately?’ upstage the birthday girl’s bash. Back home by nine. A woman from the tagging company comes round at quarter to midnight. She gets down on her knees to measure my ankle and fit the tag. I think of scenes from the life of Christ.

Night 3: Friday. Am getting used to walking around with the tag. By a weird coincidence, I lost the feeling in one side of my left ankle last year. Nerve damage after an operation for varicose veins. So by putting the tag there, I can’t actually feel like anything’s changed. Not uncomfortable in the slightest.

I worry about the grey colour, though. It looks too ‘cool’. I am uneasy about appearing ‘cool’, and am careful to point this out when showing people the tag.

Ricky Gervais once suggested that the best way to stop youths collecting ASBOs as badges of honour would be to make the tag bright pink, with the words ‘Mummy’s Little Bender’ in a girlish font across it.

The back of the tagging firm’s leaflet says, in big and friendly lower case:

‘we are here to help you
if you need us – just call!!’

I stare at the double exclamation marks and think far too much about them.

It’s been a while since I was held through the night. No longer. Say hello to my little friend.

He’s moved in along with his Brother, GSM Site Monitoring Unit, and Sister Leaflet.

It’s all so stupid, and it’s all my fault.

A while ago I did some paid work while neglecting to tell the Department For Work And Pensions. I knew I wasn’t entitled to the full dole while it was going on, and suspected I could probably have claimed Back To Work Credits, or Working Tax Credits instead, or a bit of a both. But I did nothing.

Why? Sheer depressive ineptitude. On top of which – my therapist thinks – there’s a dark, childish part of me that wanted to get into trouble. In a rather cowardly, pathetic, defaulter’s way. No action needed. A sin of omission. A cry for help. Society will come to me. And it will hold onto me. I walk through this world in a dream stance. Finally, I have physical proof it exists.

Certainly it wasn’t an attempt to knowingly defraud the system to my own advantage. I’m stupid, but not THAT stupid. While working, I was paying proper tax on the wages, and even I knew that this would show up against my NI number on the government computers. Then they’d sort things out for me, I assumed. They’ll work it out, and I’ll probably have to pay back an overpayment. I can’t think straight enough to sort out my benefits, said the depression, but they will.  They’ll take care of it.

Except by that time I’d run up an overpayment of more than £2000. And it turns out the DWP instantly prosecutes for debts above this amount, even when they’re being paid back.

Which is why this Wednesday I found myself in the City Of Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Horseferry Road, with a legal aid lawyer, pleading guilty to inadvertent benefit fraud.

I didn’t think it’d go as far as an actual punishment. It’s my first ever time in trouble with the law, at the age of 38. I was rather hoping for a conditional discharge, a caution, a fine, and a stern instruction to sort my life out.

To help my case, I provided the court with letters proving a history of clinical depression, for which I’m currently undergoing treatment. A letter from a mental health advocate from the charity Mind. A prescription of 20mg Citalopram daily. An hour with an NHS therapist every Wednesday morning. A certificate from the Expert Patient Programme which I went on earlier this year, which provides help and training in managing one’s long-term illnesses. Regular meetings with a supervisor from the NHS Working For Health programme, who specialises in finding jobs for people like me. She also ensures I’m claiming the right benefits at the right time. From now on.

Added to which, I was already paying back the overpayment. And I was contrite, I was sorry, I was showing remorse (just try and stop me), I was of ‘previously good character’, and I was pleading guilty. All of which pleased the magistrates. But, they said, the amount of the debt still meant a conviction with punishment. No exceptions.

Unpaid community work wasn’t an option, as I’d proven myself to be (a) rather bad at holding down regular work of any kind, and (b) clearly a fragile, child-like, sociopathic sort that makes darts pause in mid-flight. In fact, a tagged curfew was the most lenient option they could give me. The litter patrol was the next step up.

I’d gotten off lightly, they said. You’re lucky. You won’t hear from us again. Just stick to the curfew and it’ll be over. Well, except for the small matter of acquiring a criminal record. But, they assured me, it’s a statutory offence, not a dishonest one. That distinction should make things easier when applying for work, or getting into foreign countries. In theory.

They also fined me £100 for legal costs. And I still have to pay back all of the overpayment.

Last night, at quarter to midnight, a woman from a security firm wearing crime-scene forensic gloves came round to fit the tag. It’s waterproof, so I can bathe and shower in it. I just have to be at home from 9pm to 6am every night from now till August 25th.

I’m fine. Just angry with myself. And unbelievably sorry. I’m sorry to the authorities and the lawyers for taking up their time with this pettiness. I’m sorry to my loving and endlessly supportive parents for putting them through it too. And I’m sorry to the performers, staff and audience at my club night next Weds, who are now going to have to manage without the host and promoter. More of which in the next entry.

The security firm has me down as ‘Richards Edwards’ (sic). Somehow, that’s the most annoying aspect.