Overview
- Official figures show 91 mistaken releases between 1 April and 31 October 2025, averaging about three a week.
- David Lammy is set to deliver a Commons statement as Robert Jenrick presses for totals, details on those still at large, and the number of violent or sexual offenders involved.
- The government has ordered stronger release checks, deployed digital support to prisons, and commissioned an independent review into systemic failures.
- Officials now believe three offenders remain at large after reporting confusion that included a miscount in earlier tallies.
- The crisis follows high-profile errors at HMP Chelmsford and HMP Wandsworth, with one offender deported and two others returned to custody, against a backdrop of 262 erroneous releases in the year to March 2025.