"Alex Davies-Jones, a justice minister, told broadcasters she was furious about the unacceptable situation where 22 people are wrongly released from prisons each month in England and Wales. She said the archaic paper-based system within the prison service was partly to blame and that the government was introducing a crack team of digital experts to overhaul it. She said the reams and reams of paperwork led to situations where people who had the same name or many aliases were mixed up."
"Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, said Lammy's responses to questions in the Commons had been a disgrace and a total dereliction of duty. Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he said: The second convicted sex offender, illegal migrant in two weeks has been released accidentally from one of our prisons, despite the fact that the justice secretary after the first incident came to parliament and said that he was putting in place the most robust checks to ensure this never happened again."
Prison governors were summoned to an urgent meeting after the wrongful release of two prisoners, including a convicted foreign sex offender. The justice minister said 22 people are wrongly released from prisons each month and attributed errors partly to an archaic paper-based prison records system and to chronic criminal justice spending cuts. The government announced a crack team of digital experts to overhaul processes. A retired senior police officer is conducting a rapid review due within weeks. The justice secretary faced criticism for evasive answers and for delays in notifying police after the erroneous release.
#wrongful-prison-release #paper-based-records #digital-overhaul #criminal-justice-funding #ministerial-accountability
Read at www.theguardian.com
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