A domestic abuse survivor has described feeling as though she is living in a “circus” after the first wave of Labour’s early-release programme put hundreds of offenders back into the community, including people convicted of violent and sexual crimes.
About 700 prisoners serving sentences of up to 19 months were released on the first day of the scheme. More than 4,500 inmates are expected to be freed early by June.
The prisoners include thieves and fraudsters, as well as some domestic abusers and offenders jailed for specified violent or sexual offences. The policy has prompted renewed concern about the potential risks to victims and their families.
Nick Timothy, the Conservative shadow justice secretary, branded the move an “insult to victims” and warned that the public would ultimately “pay the price”.
Rachel Williams, who founded Stand up to Domestic Abuse, also attacked the decision. She said the public would be celebrating if domestic abuse perpetrators were ever given what she regarded as a meaningful prison sentence.
Speaking to Times Radio, Ms Williams said: “We can’t get decent sentences for non-fatal strangulation. Yet we see people sent to prison for long periods for offences such as throwing a plastic bottle at a police officer.”
She added: “If someone who committed domestic abuse received two years in prison, we’d be clapping like a bunch of seals. But we don’t see that happening.”
“Sometimes I wake up and, if I’m completely honest, feel as though I’m in a circus and the country is being run by clowns. Domestic abuse is not rocket science.”
Prime Minister Andy Burnham has faced criticism after around 700 prisoners serving sentences of up to 19 months were released early
Rachel Williams, founder of Stand up to Domestic Abuse, said people would be “clapping like a bunch of seals” if an abuse perpetrator received even a two-year prison sentence. She is pictured with her abusive husband
Former safeguarding minister Jess Phillips said she expected many domestic abuse offenders released early to be sent back to prison
Ms Williams said the criminal justice system was “constantly letting us down”, adding: “We’re sick of the lip service and we deserve better.”
Ms Williams, from Newport, Wales, was shot in the leg and brutally assaulted after asking her former husband, Darren Williams, for a divorce in 2011.
Her former husband attacked her at the salon where she worked before later taking his own life. Six weeks afterwards, Ms Williams’s 16-year-old son also died by suicide after witnessing years of abuse.
Jess Phillips, the former safeguarding minister, said she expected significant numbers of domestic abuse offenders to be recalled to prison after their early release.
She said: “I would be lying if I said I was completely confident that everything I believe should be in place — and that many of us have fought to establish — will actually be there today.”
Ms Phillips added: “I expect there will be huge numbers of domestic abusers recalled to prison because they breach their orders or licence conditions, contact their victims or approach their children.”
Among those released was 36-year-old Shaun Craigie, who walked out of HMP Pentonville in north London carrying a clear plastic bag. When asked why he had been jailed, he replied: “Domestics.”
About 20 minutes later, 43-year-old Mohammed Sharif left the prison after serving 21 months for a domestic offence involving his partner.
Mr Sharif maintained that he was innocent and said he was pleased to be released early, complaining that prison contained “a lot of horrible things”, including mice and cockroaches.
For some, freedom did not last long, with one Wandsworth inmate stopped by British Transport Police officers seconds after walking out
Inmates pour out of HMP Durham in the north-east of England this morning. It is unknown what crimes they had been serving sentences for
More scenes of jubilation outside Leeds Prison today as early releases got underway. t is unknown what crimes they had been serving sentences for
Two men on a motorbike outside HMP Leeds show support for the prisoners that have been released today. It is unknown what crimes they had been serving sentences for
Also walking free today was Alastair McCallum, 36, who had served six months of a 13-month sentence for ABH. He said: ‘It feels good to be out. I was in for a domestic.’
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One domestic abuse survivor expressed her fears that her ex-husband will pursue her after he is let out on licence.
Claire Milne was abused over a period of eight years by Robert Dales, 36, who was sentenced in March to three years in prison for controlling and coercive behaviour.
Ms Milne, who fled her home with her nine-week-old baby in April 2025, now fears for her life.
‘I am scared that he will come after me – I don’t want to die,’ she told the BBC.
‘I am not a silly woman. I know that I’ve been in a very high–risk domestic abuse relationship and I know what he’s capable of because I lived it.’
The Government says it has been forced to let criminals out to free up space in overcrowded jails and stop the justice system from collapsing.
Justice Secretary Alex Norris said: ‘We understand the anxiety victims face ahead of offenders’ release dates, but the greatest danger to victims would be prisons running out of cells for dangerous criminals, which was the crisis this Government inherited.
Robert Dales, 36, who was sentenced in March to three years in prison for abusing his wife, Claire Milne. They are pictured together
‘Our plan will make sure this never happens again by building 14,000 prison places while subjecting offenders to the toughest–ever controls, leaving them nowhere to hide and under no doubt that we are watching them.’
The first releases coincided with the Justice Secretary being sworn in as Lord Chancellor at a ceremony at the Royal Courts of Justice in central London on the first day of the new legal year, where he vowed to the most senior judges in England and Wales that he would be ‘ambitious’ in his bid to cut the backlog of court cases.
Catherine Atkinson, Labour MP for Derby North and chairman of the Commons Justice Committee, said the releases were ‘regretfully a matter of necessity after more than a decade of policy failure to manage the estate’s long–running capacity issues’.
The safety of victims and the public ‘must be paramount,’ she said, adding: ‘Serious questions remain over the pressures on probation and prison staff, the effectiveness of electronic monitoring, as well as the system’s readiness to manage the return of offenders back into communities in the coming months.’
Speaking outside HMP Wandsworth today, Reform UK’s candidate for mayor of London insisted she would ‘hang my head in shame’ if she were Prime Minister Andy Burnham.
She said: ‘He (the Prime Minister) should go speak to every domestic abuse victim who is fleeing her home and look them in the eye and say how’s he going to help them, what’s he going to do for them?’
Labour’s previous early release scheme – allowing offenders out after serving 40 per cent of their sentences – has seen 70,066 criminals freed between its launch in September 2024 and the end of March.
It led to distasteful scenes at its launch when lags celebrated their freedom outside jails.
Some were collected by friends in expensive sports cars or popped bottles of bubbly, while others vowed to be lifelong Labour voters as a result of their early release.
The replacement scheme, coming into force tomorrow, offers even larger sentence reductions for many criminals and applies to a far wider range of criminals, including those convicted of sexual and serious violent offences.
Mr Burnham paused the programme over the summer and later announced that criminals convicted of rape, serious child sex offences and grooming would be excluded.
Then there was a further outcry, with the widow of murdered PC Andrew Harper blasting the scheme as ‘deplorable’.
Lissie Harper – who married the officer one month before he was dragged to his death by a car in 2019 – blasted Labour after it emerged that two of his killers would be eligible under the new scheme.
The PM changed the terms again to exclude those convicted of unlawful killing, including all forms of manslaughter.
The early release scheme was set out in Labour’s Sentencing Act which also contained separate measures which, from March this year, largely barred the courts from imposing prison sentences of 12 months or less.
Senior police chiefs have repeatedly warned the measures as a whole will lead to an increase in crime and cost forces £400million a year to deal with.
