Prisoners released ‘without risk assessment’
Four in ten prisoners are released on license without consideration of the danger they might pose to the public, a new report finds.
A joint study by the probation, police and prisons watchdogs finds that while the system of public protection has improved in recent years, better coordination is needed between the agencies responsible for releasing criminals into the community.
It says police are not sufficiently involved in decisions about releasing offenders on license, nor were the risks posed by the most dangerous offenders reviewed often enough.
The research comes amid heightened public concern about the issue – in May a review into the brutal murder of mother Naomi Bryant highlighted a catalogue of failures that led to her killer, ex-offender Anthony Rice, being freed to attack again.
There was also outrage following the revelation that Damien Hanson, who stabbed financier John Monckton to death at his London home in November 2004, was on probation.
Shadow home secretary David Davis said today’s report revealed yet more failure at the Home Office, a department which even the home secretary earlier this year agreed was “not fit for purpose”.
“This is yet more failure by departments within the Home Office to work effectively together. This has led to disastrous consequences with the public paying an extremely high price,” he said.
“It beggars belief that 40 per cent of offenders are released without assessment. How much longer must the public be put at serious risk of harm by this government’s utter and repeated incompetence?”
However, a Home Office spokeswoman insisted public protection was the government’s “highest priority”, saying today’s report acknowledged how many aspects of the current system were working.
In 2001, an agency – Mappa – was created to incorporate the work of police, probation and prison staff, housing and social services agencies in managing violent offenders.
But the study by HM Inspectorates of Constabulary, Prisons and Probation says these services must cooperate better to ensure the public are protected.
“In a fifth of cases of prisoners just starting their sentence, and just over a third of those prisoners about to be released, we found little evidence of positive, proactive and timely work between prisons, probation and police,” it says.
Staff must spend more time assessing criminals’ potential for reoffending and preparing them for release, the report warns, and notes there is still no nationally-agreed way of assessing the danger posed by violent offenders.
“In only half of the relevant probation cases had a comprehensive risk management plan been completed on high and very high risk of harm offenders within five working days of their release from prison,” the report warns.
But the Home Office spokeswoman said: “Since the inspection concluded a year ago the completion of initial risk of harm assessments, risk management and sentencing plans on high risk offenders have significantly increased, exceeding targets set by the Home Office.
“Offenders in custody and the community are managed accordingly through risk of harm procedures, with resources concentrated on those who present the highest risk.”
