Victims of domestic violence will be having “sleepless nights” before tomorrow’s mass release of prisoners, a Government adviser has warned, as a senior insider revealed a “high proportion” of them will be domestic abusers. The Times has the story.
Nicole Jacobs, the Domestic Abuse Commissioner, warned that about a third of survivors of domestic abuse whose perpetrators are due for release this week were likely to be unaware or unsupported.
In an interview with the Times, she said survivors of domestic violence were “paying the price” for the prisons overcrowding crisis and risked being forgotten about. She said domestic abuse victims and survivors were particularly vulnerable because their perpetrators were more likely to have contact with them, know where they lived and work or know their family, compared with other criminals being freed.
About 1,700 prisoners will be freed on Tuesday when the Government’s new early-release scheme comes into effect, almost double the number that are normally freed from jail in a whole week.
The scheme, announced as part of Labour’s immediate solution to the prisons overcrowding crisis, will release prisoners serving fixed-term tariffs at the 40% stage of their sentence rather than 50%, the first time that the automatic release point for prisoners will fall below the halfway point.
It was announced eight weeks ago to give the Probation Service enough time to prepare. However, a senior probation officer has told the Times that by the time the Prisons Service had determined who was eligible, many colleagues had been given only four weeks to prepare for offenders confirmed for release. The officer said a colleague had been given just one week’s notice of an offender being released next week.
Shabana Mahmood, the Justice Secretary, sought to limit the number of domestic abusers being released under the scheme by excluding prisoners serving sentences for crimes such as non-fatal strangulation, coercive control, stalking, harassment or breach of a restraining or non-molestation order.
However, there are no measures in place to prevent domestic abusers being released who were convicted of broader offences that are not specific to domestic violence. It means those convicted of offences such as assault or criminal damage, for example, will qualify for the early-release scheme.
The Ministry of Justice has said it was unable to calculate the number of domestic abusers who would be released because it was difficult to distinguish them from other violent criminals convicted of the same cohort of offences.
However, a senior Government source said: “A high proportion will be domestic abusers.”
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