Mistakenly released prisoner hands himself in as David Lammy faces fresh pressure over handling of fiasco
One of the prisoners mistakenly released from HMP Wandsworth has surrendered under mounting pressure to deal with the David Lammy debacle, and the hunt continues for a registered sex offender who remains at large.
Billy Smith, 35, was photographed grinning as he turned himself in on Thursday morning, three days after he was mistakenly released after being sentenced to 45 months in prison for multiple fraud offences. The criminal, wearing tracksuits, was seen hugging his partner and smoking a cigarette on the prison stairs before surrendering.
The latest errors were blamed on typographical errors in a system under “relentless pressure”.
Meanwhile, the justice secretary insisted he “didn’t have all the details” when he attended PMQs on Wednesday and repeatedly failed to answer questions about whether there had been another mistaken release since Epping hotel migrant Hadush Kebatu was mistakenly released last month.
Speaking as builders broke ground on a new 1,700-cell prison in Leicester, Mr Lammy said: “I first learned about this on Wednesday morning. I was at the Department getting briefings from officials and also preparing for Prime Minister’s Questions.”
“I did not have all the details in the post. This detail was actually revealed later, just after we finished Prime Minister’s Questions. “I judged it was important to have full details when updating the House and the country on serious matters like this.
“I didn’t have all the details. And the danger is that you end up misleading the House of Representatives and the public. So I made that decision. I think it was the right decision.”
His comments came despite journalists having previously been informed that Mr Lammy had been told of the evacuation overnight on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, the police manhunt continues for Algerian sex offender Brahim Kaddour-Cherif (24), who was mistakenly released from the same prison on October 29.
He was serving a sentence for trespassing with intent to steal, but had also previously been convicted of indecent exposure.
Former HM chief inspector of prisons Nick Hardwick told the BBC there was a “long-standing problem” of faulty prison releases, but blamed the government’s early release scheme for recent errors.
He claimed the system “causes confusion in parts of the prison service which are required to calculate how long someone will stay in prison”.
The Prison Officers’ Association said staff were under huge pressure to recalculate sentences after a raft of early release schemes were introduced in recent years to ease overcrowding.
The Labor government has launched a plan to allow some criminals to be released in 2024 after serving 40 per cent of their sentences instead of 50 per cent. This followed the Conservatives’ End of Custody Supervised License (ECSL) scheme, which released some prisoners 35 or 70 days early.
National chairman Mark Fairhurst said the errors at Wandsworth were due to “clerical errors”, adding: “The Prison Officers Association has repeatedly warned of increasing pressures on staff and outdated administrative systems across our prisons.
“It has taken too long for senior leaders and politicians to acknowledge these problems and take meaningful action.
“Prisons across the country are underfunded, understaffed and operating under unrelenting pressure. Dedicated staff do their best, but they often lack the support, training or technology necessary to do their jobs safely and effectively.”
By March 2025, a total of 262 prisoners had been released by mistake, up from 115 the previous year. Over the last decade, the number of erroneous publications has increased by 434 percent; That number increased from just 49 in the year ending March 2015 to 434 percent.
In a statement issued as prison governors were called to emergency meetings with ministers, the Prison Governors Association (PGA) said faulty releases were “neither rare nor secret” but agreed the extent of them was “extremely concerning”.
They said 0.5 percent of prisoners were not released on the correct date.
“While this may seem like a small percentage in a system that manages tens of thousands of releases and transfers each quarter, it represents a significant operational failure,” a spokesperson added.
They said the rise in errors reflected a system under “unprecedented and sustained pressure” as they slammed politicians who were “showing off and grandstanding” in the face of the crisis.
“Successive governments have accepted this level of risk for decades,” the PGA added. “In this context, it feels disingenuous to see politicians seeking political gain from a prison system in crisis.”
His concerns were also voiced by the Law Society, which said it was “no surprise” that the justice system had collapsed after “decades of neglect”.
Deputy Chief Brett Dixon added: “The chaos in our prisons reflects the wider crisis in the criminal justice system.
“The crisis will not be solved by politicians looking for easy headlines. It is the result of bad decisions by successive governments.”
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch said there was “an explosion of accidental prisoner releases” and described Mr Lammy’s handling of the crisis as “disgraceful”.
Speaking during a visit to the JCB Academy, he said: “We know that mistakes happen from time to time. What we are seeing now is an explosion in the accidental release of prisoners, many of whom are foreign criminals and many of whom are sex offenders. This should not happen. This should not happen.”
“We know there will always be times when errors occur, but the extent to which they occur is truly cause for concern and what we saw yesterday with David Lammy failing to answer very simple questions was disgraceful.”
Shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick claimed he did not trust Mr Lammy, describing his handling of questions at PMQs as a “disgrace”.
“The minister of justice was informed about this on Tuesday night. [and] it didn’t come out clean,” Mr Jenrick said. Today program.
“I think this is a disgrace. This is a complete dereliction of duty.”
HMP Wandsworth’s mistaken releases come just weeks after migrant sex offender Hadush Kebatu was mistakenly released from an Essex prison.
In response, Mr Lammy launched an independent investigation and promised tighter controls on released prisoners.
Kebatu’s crimes sparked a wave of protests at hotels housing asylum seekers this summer after he sexually assaulted a woman and a 14-year-old girl while living at The Bell Hotel in Epping.
