In four separate cases, women who worked in English prisons have appeared in court on charges of misconduct at work.
A 19-year-old former prison officer at HMP Five Wells appeared at Northampton Crown Court and pleaded guilty to misconduct charges arising from a sexual relationship she had with a 30-year-old prisoner. The man also pleaded guilty to offences.
The woman admitted providing her telephone number to the prisoner and failing to report his possession of an illicit mobile phone and cannabis. Both defendants admitted offences of misconduct in public office between August 2024 and March 2025 at the Northamptonshire prison. They also both pleaded guilty to a separate charge of committing misconduct on 23 November 2024. They are due to be sentenced on 5 January.
The woman was in court, and the man appeared by video-link. The court heard that the woman, acting as a prison custody officer, ‘wilfully misconducted’ herself ‘in a way which amounted to an abuse of the public’s trust’. The man encouraged and assisted both offences.
Both defendants admitted making an unauthorised transmission of an image or sound from within a prison, conveying cannabis into the prison, and conveying two mobile phones. They also pleaded guilty to making an unauthorised electronic transmission of an image relating to HMP Peterborough between December 2024 and March this year. The man admitted a seventh charge of possessing a device with a SIM card at HMP Five Wells without authority on 22 December. The 19-year-old had previously been on conditional bail but was remanded into custody after pleading guilty.
In a separate case, a 24-year-old former officer at HMP Lowdham Grange has pleaded guilty to having a relationship with an inmate and with conspiracy to supply him with cannabis. She appeared in Nottingham Crown Court, and her alleged lover appeared by video link. The pair pleaded not guilty to an additional charge of supplying cocaine to other inmates. The woman was freed on conditional bail, and they will both reappear in court on 13 April next year.
In another case, a prison worker at HMP Lindholme faked texts threatening her children so she could claim in her defence that she was forced to smuggle £250,000 of drugs into HMP Lindholme. The 40-year-old, who worked within the prison’s education department, was detained in October 2023 after she was found to be in possession of 0.5kg worth of drugs during a staff search.
When caught she claimed she had been in receipt of texts threatening her children, but it was discovered that she had written them herself. She was jailed for five years and two months at Sheffield Crown Court for possessing cocaine and ketamine with intent to supply.
Finally, a woman officer who was working at HMP Hewell used her access to prison computers to check on the wellbeing of her boyfriend who was serving a sentence in HMP Birmingham. She then convinced two women to visit him, smuggle cannabis in with them, and get him to swallow it. Unfortunately for all of them, when they tried it for the third month running, he could not swallow the drugs and so was caught.
The prison traced the officer’s phone calls from work to the two other women, and now all are awaiting sentencing.
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