Prisons & Probation – Latest News:
- Sat, 07 Mar 2026 10:40:34 +0000: Soham murderer Ian Huntley dies after HMP Frankland prison attack - Prisons and probation | The Guardian
School caretaker who killed 10-year-olds Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002 was reportedly assaulted with metal bar
The child killer Ian Huntley has died in hospital, just over a week after being attacked at a maximum security prison.
The former school caretaker killed Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, both aged 10, in Soham, Cambridgeshire on 4 August 2002. The girls had left a family barbecue to buy sweets.
Continue reading... - Wed, 04 Mar 2026 09:28:20 +0000: The UK scandal of women handcuffed while in labour: ‘I was so shocked when the restraints weren’t removed’ - Prisons and probation | The Guardian
Pregnant women prisoners in England are being handcuffed to prison officers – often male – during intimate vaginal examinations and long, agonising births. Will this dehumanising treatment be stopped?
The worst moment of Joanna’s labour was an internal examination. She was handcuffed with her legs splayed apart and a female prison officer at the foot of the hospital bed saw everything. She had prepared for the arrival of her first baby as carefully as she could. But she understood that birth can be unpredictable – and this was complicated by the fact that, during the latter part of her pregnancy, she was serving a jail sentence.
Joanna was a model prisoner who followed the rules. She had been convicted for a non-violent drugs offence and was not deemed to be at high risk of escape, particularly not in the throes of an agonising labour. She hoped to use hypnobirthing, breathing and relaxation techniques to make the birth calmer and more comfortable. Thanks to information provided by the charity Birth Companions she knew it was her right not to be handcuffed during labour. She had highlighted the handcuffing points in the booklet.
Continue reading... - Thu, 26 Feb 2026 14:01:02 +0000: Soham murderer Ian Huntley seriously injured in prison attack - Prisons and probation | The Guardian
Inmate understood to be Huntley taken to hospital after being assaulted at HMP Frankland in County Durham
The Soham murderer Ian Huntley has been seriously injured in a prison attack in County Durham.
A prisoner, understood to be Huntley, who was convicted of killing two 10-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002, was taken to hospital after being assaulted on Thursday morning at HMP Frankland, Durham constabulary said.
Continue reading... - Wed, 18 Feb 2026 13:00:33 +0000: Wasteman review – Brit prison drama is as lethal and nasty as a sharpened toothbrush - Prisons and probation | The Guardian
Some of the tropes are familiar, but this brutally violent and gripping film sidesteps the cliches with committed acting and fierce storytelling punch
Rising stars David Jonsson and Tom Blyth bring A-game performances for this brutally violent, gripping British prison movie, as lethal and nasty as a sharpened toothbrush. Screenwriters Hunter Andrews and Eoin Doran and director Cal McMau are feature first-timers, creating a film that is a deserved Bafta nominee in the outstanding British debut category. Some of the tropes are familiar, but this film sidesteps the cliches with the committed acting and fierce storytelling punch.
The scene is an overcrowded jail (filmed in Shepton Mallet) whose ugly savagery and chaos we periodically see through the smartphone screen of someone gleefully filming it – the kind of jail which has forced the government’s policy of early prisoner release to take pressure off the system. Jonsson (from TV’s Industry) is Taylor, a shamblingly submissive and timid drug addict, who can hardly believe that this new arrangement means he is due for parole in a fortnight; he is pathetically excited at the thought of seeing his teenage son.
Continue reading... - Sat, 14 Feb 2026 18:45:00 +0000: Animol review – gritty young offenders drama challenges conventional machismo - Prisons and probation | The Guardian
Institutional menace and an idealistic take on redemption sit side-by-side in Top Boy actor Ashley Walters’ empathic and occasionally over-earnest film
The lawless brutality of a young offender institution is the setting for this British movie written by Marching Powder’s Nick Love and directed by Ashley Walters. It’s a place where terrified newbies realise they can survive only by abandoning their innocence and decency, and submitting to the gang authority of a psycho top G, naturally involving a horrible loyalty test.
This is a place where drugs arrive by drone, where facially tattooed men meet each other’s gaze with a cool opaque challenge in the canteen, and where the cues and balls on the recreation area’s pool table have only one purpose: to give someone a three-month stay in the hospital wing while underpaid guards in lanyards and ill-fitting v-neck jumpers look the other way.
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