A youth mentor who helps young people to escape gangs has warned that early release prisoners face their ‘biggest fight’ on the outside.
Anton Noble spoke as around 1,100 inmates are unlocked in England and Wales today in the second tranche of the government’s scheme to ease overcrowding said to be pushing jails to the point of collapse.
The gang exit strategist is working with two teenage young offenders and two adults who have all been released ahead of schedule.
The scheme is taking place to avoid the ‘collapse of the criminal justice system’ according to justice secretary Shabana Mahmood.
The second tranche of early releases, part of her plan to free up around 5,500 places, applies to those serving sentences of five years or more.
Napo, the trade union and professional association for probation and family court workers, warned that a ‘significant’ number of those unlocked in the first release on September 10 have already been recalled to custody.
‘For some of the people leaving jail early, the toughest battle will begin once they are back out in society,’ Anton said.
‘Some prisons have good rehabilitation services but others don’t and the issues include staff being overworked due to the demand and not having the skills to help the offenders turn their lives around.
‘The issues in prisons include gangs and people being chased down over debts which they might have had on the outside.
‘The gangs have no morals or boundaries and a lot of the staff in prisons are scared of them.
‘Some prisoners don’t want to socialise to stay away from them and I’ve also heard stories about staff setting up people to be beaten up.
“Prisons should be a place to isolate people from society so they can think about their behaviour but you can’t make the change if there are no resources or people to help you.
‘I go into prisons where there is funding for services but it’s not the same everywhere and in some places it’s terrible.’
Alarming signs of the strain on prisons have been revealed by in our reports on gangs and violence in top security jails in England and Wales. Documents have shown assaults-for-cash, gang warfare and vicious attacks on jail staff.
Certain custodial sentences have been reduced from 50% to 40% under the scheme aimed at easing the pressures on the prison estate, excluding sexual and serious violence offences.
Among those waiting for offenders to be released today was Ahmed, 27, who spoke to Metro outside Wandsworth Prison while waiting for his cousin to emerge.
Ahmed, who pulled up in a £250,000 Lamborghini Urus, spoke about his own time behind bars awaiting trial for ABH.
He said: ‘It’s not fair in there, they treat you like dogs. You only get 30 minutes out of your cell a day, I’ve seen people go insane.’
Ms Mahmood said yesterday that Labour had ‘inherited prisons in crisis, within days of collapse.’
She also announced a independent review into prison sentencing to be carried out by former justice secretary David Gauke, which will examine ‘tough alternatives’ to custody.
Anton, 33, who works across the West Midlands, London, Milton Keynes and Northampton, said that the location and social connections of those being freed will be a major factor in the risk they pose to themselves and others.
The mentor’s work leading the Guiding Young Minds intervention team takes him to prisons and young offender institutions for workshops and talks. He is due to give a motivation talk at HMP Birmingham to mark Black History Month next week.
(Picture: Peter Byrne/PA Wire)
‘Two of the people I know who were eligible are under 17, one came out on September 10 and the other was released a week later,’ Anton said.
‘They have matured a lot and the issue is that they don’t want to be around the same people in the outside world.
‘So there’s a battle they have with themselves to stay away from gangs and the pitfalls that put them inside in the first place.
‘I am helping them to reposition themselves back into society, which is a very delicate process because I don’t want them to revert back to the behaviour that put them in prison.
‘The young people I work with have trauma and life loss, and I am helping them to find a place of peace.’
Released offenders are being monitored on license by the Probation Service through measures which can include electronic tagging and curfews.
The MoJ maintains that the service has spent adequate time preparing prisoners for release and ensuring support is in place to meet their resettlement needs such as work and accommodation.
‘Some people will go out and look to do good with this, but for others it will be a real struggle to stay away from the bad influences that landed them in prison in the first place,’ Anton said.
‘If they haven’t managed to change their ways and have made connections with the wrong people inside, where the postcode gang rivalries are replicated, it will cause a lot of issues for the police and the community.
‘They’ll be coming out with even greater criminal mindsets and I fear that will cause a lot of issues with gangs, knives and drugs when there are already a lot of problems at the moment.
‘I’m not in favour of just letting out people to free up more room, the person should have shown that they’re remorseful and they’ve changed their mindset.’
Ms Mahmood has warned that if the move to ease prison crowding is not taken, courts will be forced to delay sending offenders to jail and police unable to arrest dangerous criminals.
Speaking at HMP Five Wells in July, she warned of a ‘total breakdown of law and order’ if immediate action was not taken.
An MoJ spokesperson said: ‘The new government inherited a justice system in crisis, with prisons on the point of collapse.
‘It has been forced to introduce an early release programme to stop a crisis that would have overwhelmed the criminal justice system, meaning we would no longer be able to lock up dangerous criminals and protect the public.’
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