Since it opened, 18 female employees at a jail that pioneered a liberal philosophy have had romantic relationships with prisoners, according to information obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.
As their affairs were made public within its first six years of operation, 18 women, including full-time officers and contract personnel at HMP Berwyn in north Wales, were fired or resigned. Three people have been sent to jail for improper conduct in a public office.
Prisoners Have Rooms Rather Than Prisons
The prison, which has space for 2,000 inmates and opened in 2017 as Britain’s second largest, pioneered a liberal approach to create a more domestic environment to aid rehabilitation.
Cells were rebranded as rooms, prison blocks were known as communities, and inmates were given laptops when they arrived.
To aid inmates’ rehabilitation before they are let back into society, the prison attempts to establish a more domestic environment.
The 18 included four female prison employees who were fired, two partner agency employees who were fired (perhaps including NHS healthcare workers), three prison employees who resigned, and nine partner agency employees who resigned.
The Prison Officers’ Association (POA) said that due to recruitment issues that prevented governors from conducting face-to-face interviews to choose their own staff, novice officers had been taken advantage of by “highly experienced” offenders.
They were instead centrally hired through assessment tests and Zoom interviews.
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Jail Officers’ Relationships
A record 36 female prison officials have been fired for relationships in the last three years, more than double the number in the preceding four years (19), according to the disclosure.
Ayshea Gunn, a prison officer at Berwyn, was sentenced to a year in prison after having an affair with Khuram Razaq, a prisoner who was 29 and serving a term for conspiring to rob, according to the news report.
As she was meant to be on duty at the super jail, she exchanged explicit films and images with them and even took a photo of them kissing.
The same court sentenced 26-year-old Emily Watson of Berwyn to a year in prison in April 2019 for twice having sex with and once performing a sex act on an inmate in his cell.
She spent a lot of time with prisoner John McGee, which raised suspicions among the staff. An investigation was begun, and the affair was revealed.
After falling in love with 25-year-old prisoner Alex Coxon, Jennifer Gavin, 27, was sentenced to eight months in prison for sending him sexually explicit videos of herself on a phone she snuck into the facility.
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