Twelve more prisoners released in error, with two still missing, says Lammy

Mr. Lammy later told ITV that he had been "advised" that the two prisoners currently at large were not violent or sex offenders. He declined to elaborate on the details of those cases, stating, "I'm not going to go into the details of those cases because the police are operational decisions, and you'll know if they're going to jail someone they don't want to blow the news."

High-Profile Mistakes

• The issue of accidental releases received significant attention following the mistaken release of Hadush Kebatu, who was arrested for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman while staying in an asylum hotel in Epping. Kebatu was re-arrested two days later and has now been deported to Ethiopia.

   
   

• Following Kebatu's release, news emerged of two other prisoners who had been released in error: William Smith, who later surrendered himself, and Brahim Kaddour-Cherif, who was rearrested.

   

These cases culminated in the government implementing new security protocols, including a "clear checklist" for prison governors to follow when releasing prisoners.

📈 The Scale of the Problem

The most recent news came on November 11th, when Mr. Lammy addressed the House of Commons, outlining the government's efforts to address the problem.

• Last year, the number of prisoners released in error increased by 128%, rising from 115 in the 2023–2024 financial year to 262 in the following year.

   

• In 2024–2025, just over 57,000 prisoners completed the custodial portion of their sentences in England and Wales, up by around 13% year-on-year.

• The statistics on mistaken releases include cases where people were released either too early or too late.

Mr. Lammy confessed to the increase in figures, saying, "I want to bring it down but we have a mountain to scale."

Causes and Criticism

Mr. Lammy attributed the problem, in part, to the fact that the department had lost 6,000 officers under the previous Conservative government.

However, Robert Jenrick, the Shadow Justice Minister, attributed the rise to "the chaos created by Labour's botched early release scheme," a scheme introduced by the government to ease overcrowding in prisons. He said, "The public are continually put in risk as a result of his shambolic leadership. When will this fiasco end?"

Liberal Democrat spokeswoman Jess Brown-Fuller also criticised the situation, calling it "completely intolerable that public safety has been put at risk once more," and demanding that "both the government and the prison service must admit to their mistakes and promise that these mistakes will cease occurring once and for all."

🛠️ Government Actions and Investigations

Last month, Mr. Lammy laid out the steps taken by the government to solve the problem, which included:

• Investing up to £10 million for new AI tools to minimise human error.

   

• Upgrading the prison's paper-based system.

Additionally, the government has requested former Met Police Commissioner Lynne Owens to conduct an investigation into the conduct that resulted in Kebatu's release and the subsequent corrections throughout the prison system. She is set to report her findings in February 2026.

Chief Inspector's Concerns

Charlie Taylor, Chief Inspector of Prisons, stated that the increasing number of mistaken releases indicated that "something is going to go wrong" with the prison system. Speaking to the BBC in October, he said mistakes partly resulted because "inexperienced" employees were being expected to deal with "huge caseloads."

He also noted that officers were expected to implement rapidly changing policies, including several early release plans introduced by both the previous Conservative government and the new Labour government. Mr. Taylor also stated that many prisons were "reliant" on officers from West African nations, and that new Home Office visa laws could force these officers to leave the country.