‘Deep-rooted’ issues in the criminal justice system have led to an ‘unacceptably high’ number of prisoners being release by mistake in England and Wales.

An independent review into erroneous releases from prison was commissioned after the mistaken release of sex offender Hadush Kebatu. Government data has revealed 179 prisoners have been wrongly released in the past 12 months. The review, led by Dame Lynne Owens pointed to systemic problems due to fourteen years of ‘austerity, staffing cuts, failure to build prison places, and underinvestment in digital infrastructure.’

The Ministry of Justice’s released a statement last week accepting the recommendations of the review and recognised that the number of errors was ‘unacceptably high’, exposing ‘deep-rooted’ issues within a ‘broken’ system. As well as reviewing the specific issues related to the mistaken release of Kebatu, Dame Lynne’s report found that it is ‘highly likely’ that the complex sentencing regime, with limited support and technological support for staff,  is ‘increasing the likelihood of sentence miscalculations’.

The government announced up to £82 million to tackle the recommendations of the review. This includes £8 million to be invested in manual checks in the Crown and Magistrates Courts, the recruitment and training of 90 additional Crown Court clerks, and 75 extra staff positioned in the Magistrates court. The Government also pledged to invest a record £550 million over the next three years in victim and witness support services.

Within the response, the Government thanked the Police in their role in returning those mistakenly released to custody and issued apologies to the victims of those released.

This included the victims of sex offender Hadush Kebatu, whom the force spent 3 days and over £150,000 searching for last October. His mistaken release came only a week after Justice Secretary, David Lammy, announced enhanced checks in all prisons across England and Wales.

The Prison Reform Trust welcomed the government’s acceptance of Dame Lynne’s findings. The charity said that simpler rules and new systems will help but ‘the system would remain vulnerable’ without resolving staffing pressures.