credit, Getty Images
-
- author, Shima Koteka
- roll, Senior correspondent for BBC News UK
The British government has come under criticism and pressure to provide an explanation after several incidents of prisoners being mistakenly released from British prisons have come to light.
Recent cases include searches for four inmates who were mistakenly released in 2024 and 2025. Other prisoners have been released in recent months in similar cases but are already in custody.
A total of 262 prisoners were mistakenly released in England and Wales between March 2024 and March 2025. This total is a 128% increase compared to the 115 cases recorded in the previous 12 months.
case study
According to information from the BBC, two prisoners released last year are still at large. Two others who were mistakenly released in June 2025 also remain missing.
Details have emerged about four prisoners who were mistakenly released as pressure on the government mounts.
Two others who were mistakenly released from London’s Wandsworth Prison are now remanded in custody following an intense police raid over the past week.
This Friday (7/11), Algerian sex offender Brahim Kadour Cherif was arrested, and on Thursday (6th), British man William Smith surrendered.
credit, police station
Kadour Sherif was released from prison on October 29, but was arrested by police after being spotted by a member of the public in the Finsbury Park area of north London.
He was convicted of indecent assault in November 2024 and sentenced to 18 months in prison. The Algerian was also added to the country’s sex offenders register for five years.
Kadour Sherif remained in the UK after his tourist visa expired in 2019 and is believed to have been in the early stages of deportation proceedings.
William Smith was sentenced to prison on the same day and released on Monday (3/11). He was sentenced to 45 months in prison for multiple fraud charges.
Hadush Kebatou, who arrived in the UK on a small boat and was arrested for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman while staying in a refugee hotel, has been mistakenly released from Chelmsford Prison in Essex. He was then recaptured and deported.
credit, essex police
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson told the BBC: “While the vast majority of wrongly released offenders are quickly returned to prison, we will work with police to do everything we can to catch the small number of offenders who still remain in the community.”
Attorney General David Lamy had promised the “toughest regulations in history” to prevent further mistakes after Hadush Kebatu was wrongly released last month.
Earlier, Opposition Attorney General Robert Jenrick said the missing prisoners revealed “the incompetence of this government”.
“The task of uncovering the facts should not be left to reporters. (Attorney Secretary) David Lammy needs to find out how many prisoners were wrongly released and how many are still at large,” he said.
Liberal Democrat spokeswoman Jess Brown Fuller said “every resource” must be used to find the prisoners and described the situation as “disgraceful and a complete mess”.
This week, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he was “furious and frustrated” by the incident.
Speaking publicly for the first time about the release, the Labor leader blamed the previous Conservative government’s “failures” for the overburdened prison system, but added: “We recognize it is our responsibility to step in and deal with this.”
About The Author
