\n<\/p>\n
Ministers were warned by a watchdog that prisoners were \u201cfalling through the cracks\u201d of chaotic release procedures at the jail that mistakenly freed a convicted child sex offender.<\/p>\n
An annual report on HMP Chelmsford uncovered \u201ca litany of issues and errors\u201d including \u201ca mix-up of release dates\u201d when letting out a vulnerable prisoner.<\/p>\n
The Essex facility is at the centre of an inquiry after Hadush Kebatu, an Ethiopian national, was accidentally freed despite convictions for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman days after arriving in the UK in a small boat.<\/p>\n
The emergence of the report, published by the jail\u2019s independent monitoring board [IMB] in December and sent to the prisons minister, James Timpson, will raise fresh questions about who should be held responsible for the debacle.<\/p>\n
Kebatu was released from prison a week ago on Friday by mistake when he was supposed to be removed to an immigration detention centre. He was arrested in north London on Sunday and deported to Addis Ababa on Wednesday after being given a \u00a3500 discretionary payment.<\/p>\n
<\/span>Met police appeal to Epping sex offender to hand himself in \u2013 video <\/span><\/p>\n According to the IMB report, HMP Chelmsford\u2019s release processes were examined after receiving a complaint from an \u201cextremely stressed\u201d vulnerable prisoner who, a few hours before release, had been given no information about where he might live or how to contact his probation officer.<\/p>\n \u201cOn investigation, we discovered a litany of issues and errors that had led to this situation: the failure of officers to collect the prisoner for his release process briefing; a re-arranged release process briefing cancelled because it clashed with a knife awareness course; and a mix-up over release dates.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile we must assume these instances are rare, we would urge those involved to update their processes to stop prisoners \u2018falling through the cracks\u2019,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n Prisoners are supposed to be given help and advice \u201cin the last 12 weeks of their sentence\u201d, according to the MoJ\u2019s website.<\/p>\n In response, to the report, Timpson wrote a two-page letter, but did not address the issue of release procedures. \u201cI note you have raised some local issues of concern in your report, which the governor will continue to keep you aware of as work continues,\u201d Timpson wrote.<\/p>\n An asylum seeker who crossed the Channel on a small boat on 29 June, Kebatu was housed at the Bell hotel in Epping, Essex. Eight days after his arrival, he made sexually explicit remarks to a 14-year-old girl who was eating a pizza with her friend in Epping town centre.<\/p>\n The next day, he sexually assaulted a woman, trying to kiss her. He also tried to kiss the same 14-year-old girl he had made remarks to the day before, having encountered her again by chance.<\/p>\n The allegations led to public disorder outside the hotel in Epping, which became a flashpoint between far-right activists and anti-racism campaigners. It also led to protests outside hotels across England, Wales and Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n At the entrance of the prison, Kebatu was observed by a delivery driver returning to the prison several times over an hour and a half, in a \u201cconfused\u201d state, only to be turned away. He reportedly told prison officers that he was supposed to be deported, but was told to go towards the town centre.<\/p>\n <\/span>Kebatu was eventually apprehended in north London after his accidental release.<\/span> Photograph: Metropolitan Police\/PA<\/p>\n The former Met police deputy commissioner Lynne Owens is chairing the investigation into why Kebatu was freed by mistake. David Lammy, the justice secretary, blamed \u201chuman error\u201d after a single staff member was suspended. The prison officers\u2019 union and the prisons\u2019 watchdog have warned ministers not to scapegoat prison staff for a systemic issue.<\/p>\n The suspended member of staff was responsible for going through the paperwork to ensure that the right prisoner was being released under the right conditions. However, the manager was checking paperwork that had already been processed by more senior staff, it is understood.<\/p>\n The Ministry of Justice declined to explain whether the department had addressed failings raised in the report because of the ongoing inquiry.<\/p>\n Lammy said: \u201cAny release in error is one too many. That is why I have taken immediate action to introduce the strongest release checks ever and launched an independent investigation to get to the bottom of what went wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ministers were warned by a watchdog that prisoners were \u201cfalling through the cracks\u201d of chaotic release procedures at the jail that mistakenly freed a convicted child sex offender. An annual report on HMP Chelmsford uncovered \u201ca litany of issues and errors\u201d including \u201ca mix-up of release dates\u201d when letting out a vulnerable prisoner. The Essex<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31859,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[14367,4588,321,8943,17900,2413,2414,958,4113,5584],"class_list":{"0":"post-31858","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-social-issues","8":"tag-errors","9":"tag-jail","10":"tag-ministers","11":"tag-mistake","12":"tag-offender","13":"tag-prisons","14":"tag-probation","15":"tag-released","16":"tag-sex","17":"tag-warned"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31858"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31858\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/31859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}