Young convicts ruling fuels prison crisis
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Your support makes all the difference.About 1,500 young men are being held unlawfully in adult jails a High Court ruling is expected to reveal today.
Prison officials were last night drawing up emergency contingency plans to move the offenders, aged between 15 and 21, to specialist custodial accommodation. The expensive move will be a big blow to the Prison Service which is already struggling to deal with an overcrowding crisis.
It follows a ruling in the High Court on Tuesday that it was unlawful to hold a girl aged 16 with adult women inmates. Female offenders are automatically held in adult jails before being assessed and transferred to specialist wings in other prisons. The decision affects only about 50 female offenders aged under 21, but the fact that it also covers convicted young males is far more significant as there are about 5,500 in jails in England and Wales.
The Prison Service confirmed last night that it was working on the assumption that the judgment - full details of which are being disclosed today - does cover men as well as women. "We believe the ruling does not differentiate between the sexes," said a prison source.
Of the 5,500 convicted young male offenders, about 4,000 are housed in specialist Young Offender Institutions (YOI). The remaining 1,500 are kept in adult jails, often in wings put aside for their sole use. However, the ruling is expected to outlaw this practice and force the prison authorities to provide specialist youth facilities such as full education programmes.
The Prison Service was last night considering where it could put the 1,500 offenders. There are very few places left in the YOI, many of which are already full, and simply designating wings in adult jails as units for under-21s will not be sufficient to comply with the court ruling.
On the question of young female inmates, the Prison Service has identified about 50 offenders who under the new court ruling are considered unlawfully held. These are expected to be moved to jails with designated young offender wings.
A Prison Service spokesman said: "Some, but not all of them, are being moved. It's disruptive and some will have to be moved around the country away from their families."
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