UK prison crisis: 4 wrongly freed inmates at large, releases surge 128%

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy (PA) Nick Potts

Four prisoners wrongly released from English and Welsh prisons remain at large, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy confirmed. The revelation comes as monthly mistaken releases have risen from 17 under the previous Conservative government to 22 under the current Labour administration.

Nandy described the situation as "completely unacceptable" during an appearance on Sky News's Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips programme. She defended Justice Secretary David Lammy's handling of parliamentary questions about the crisis, despite opposition criticism of his transparency.

The figures mark a significant increase in wrongful releases. In the year to March 2025, 262 inmates were mistakenly freed - a 128 percent jump from the previous 12 months when 115 were released in error. Among those wrongly freed were 90 violent or sex offenders.

Two high-profile cases emerged this week. Brahim Kaddour-Cherif, an Algerian sex offender accidentally released from HMP Wandsworth on October 29, was arrested Friday in Finsbury Park. Billy Smith, a fraudster mistakenly freed Monday from the same prison, handed himself in Thursday.

Political Pressure

Shadow Defence Secretary James Cartlidge accused Lammy of evading questions in Parliament, calling it a "profound mistake and a discourtesy to parliament." Speaking to Sky News, Cartlidge said: «He had at his fingertips the facts and he's in front of parliament, he has a Ministerial Code to be transparent, and he didn't answer the questions at all.»

Nandy rejected claims Lammy was evasive. In the Sky News interview, she explained: «I was in the House of Commons chamber, I was there, I was sitting next to the home secretary, and I could see that he was weighing up in his mind what information to release.»

Systemic Failures

The government attributes the crisis partly to an "antiquated paper-based system" developed in the 1980s still used in some prisons. Lammy has appointed Dame Lynne Owens, former director of the National Crime Agency, to address the failures.

Speaking on Sky News, Nandy stressed the urgency: «Even one is too many, and the justice secretary is gripping this by appointing Dame Lynne Owens [...] to make sure that we really grip this, starting with the antiquated paper-based system [...] building new prisons, and making sure that we have additional checks so that people aren't wrongly released.»

Lammy acknowledged a "mountain to climb" in fixing the inherited prison crisis. He has ordered new release checks, commissioned an independent investigation into systemic failures, and begun overhauling archaic systems.

The Prison Officers' Association called for an "entire overhaul" of sentencing calculation and discharge processes, warning against blaming individual officers for systemic problems.

Note: This article was created with Artificial Intelligence (AI).