Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people charged with which offences have been released in error from prisons in 2023.

A prisoner is released in error if they are released earlier than their correct release date, they will be unlawfully at large until and unless they are subsequently released correctly or returned to custody. If the person released is not aware of the error and makes no attempt to evade arrest, then they have committed no offence and, in that sense, they may not be at fault.

Releases in error are monitored closely to analyse the frequency across the estate and identify any trends nationally, while taking into consideration the management of risk to the public.

Annual statistics on the numbers of prisoners released in error are published in the HMPPS Annual Digest on a financial year basis. Statistics are available for the number of prisoners released in error until March 2023 in the “chapter 1 tables – escapes offence data tool” which can be accessed at the following link. The pivot table includes breakdowns by incident type, for releases in error, and offence of the prisoner for each financial year.

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hmpps-annual-digest-april-2022-to-march-2023.

Data for the remainder of 2023 will be published in the HMPPS Annual Digest for the 23/24 financial year.