HMP Wandsworth back in the spotlight after mistaken release of prisoner

The mistaken release of a foreign prisoner at HMP Wandsworth has put the scandal-hit Victorian jail back into the headlines once again.

The Met Police have launched a manhunt to track down Algerian man Brahim Kaddour-Cherif after he was accidentally released last Wednesday.

This happened less than a week after migrant sex offender Hadush Kebatu was freed by mistake at HMP Chelmsford instead of being taken to a immigration removal centre.

While prisoners released in error is on the rise, chaos at HMP Wandsworth has been previously laid bare through a high-profile prisoner escape.

In September 2023, former soldier Daniel Khalife, later found guilty for spying for Iran, escaped from the south-west London jail by clinging to the underside of a food delivery truck.

He was caught on a canal towpath by a plainclothes detective days later.

The prison was put into special measures last year as one of 10 jails issued with an urgent notice to improve since November 2022.

On taking emergency action, chief inspector of prisons Charlie Taylor said the prison was “still reeling” from Khalife’s “very high-profile” escape and that security remained a “serious concern”.

It emerged in court that two guards checked the truck with a torch and mirror, and, with no apparent lockdown already in place, allowed it to leave the prison, despite telling the driver someone was missing.

In 2024, inspectors said the turmoil they found at “severely overcrowded” HMP Wandsworth was the result of “sustained decline permitted to happen in plain view of leaders” and warned how prison guards did not always know where prisoners on their wings were, despite an investment of almost £900,000 since the escape.

But in the latest review of the prison in April this year, the watchdog noted a new governor has brought “energy and focus” to the prison, and was prioritising safety and decency.

Inspectors found “substantial investment” in staffing and training but overall level of experience were low.

“There was still a long way to go to rectify the many problems identified at the previous inspection, but it was good to see progress being made,” the watchdog said.

In October, a further report by HMP Wandsworth’s independent monitoring board (IMB), made up of volunteers tasked by ministers with scrutinising conditions in custody, found that staffing was a recurrent problem, with an average of a third of staff absent a day.

It also found the crumbling 170-year-old building meant living conditions were “unacceptable” and inhumane”.

IMB chairman Matthew Andrews said: “The improvement in the prison’s performance after the disastrous situation last year is welcomed and has been reflected in the largely positive conclusions of HMIP’s independent review of progress, conducted in April.

“However, until the serious staffing issues are properly addressed, the prison’s efforts to improve further will be severely hampered.”

Elsewhere earlier this year, former HMP Wandsworth prison officer Linda De Sousa Abreu, 30, was jailed for 15 months after having sex with an inmate in a cell.

Footage of the activity was widely shared on social media.