Prisoners: Suicide
(asked on 18th October 2018) - View Source
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many suicides there were in prisons and young offender institutions in each year from 2010 to the last year for which records are available.
Figures for each full year up to 2017, the latest for which data is available, are given in the table below.
Year | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 |
Assaults on prison officers | 2,848 | 3,132 | 2,987 | 3,266 | 3,640 | 4,963 | 6,844 | 8,429 |
Incidents of self-harm | 26,979 | 24,647 | 23,158 | 23,230 | 25,843 | 32,313 | 40,160 | 44,651 |
Self-inflicted deaths | 58 | 58 | 61 | 76 | 89 | 90 | 122 | 70 |
Remand prisoners % of self-inflicted deaths | 55% | 40% | 31% | 38% | 29% | 40% | 27% | 29% |
These figures include Immigration Removal Centres run by Her Majesty's Prison & Probation Service (HMPPS). “Remand” includes both prisoners who have not been convicted, and those who have been convicted but not yet sentenced. Classifications of deaths are provisional until confirmed by an inquest. “Self-inflicted death” includes any death of a person who has apparently taken their own life, irrespective of intention. This includes not only suicides but also accidental deaths resulting from the person’s own actions. This classification is used because it is not always known whether a person intended to kill themselves.