Violent criminals who pose ‘excessive threat of hurt’ to be launched early subsequent week

Violent crooks are to be released early from jail next week despite posing a “high risk of harm” to the public.

About 2,000 prisoners who have served 40% of their sentences will be freed on Tuesday as jails are running out of space. And a further 1,700 will be released early on October 22 after prisons came close to full capacity last month.

But Charlie Taylor, the chief inspector of prisons, warned there was a danger they could re-offend and end up back in jail. He called for suitable accommodation for them to be found where they can properly be supervised.

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“If people go out homeless, there’s a big danger that they fall back into offending,” he said.

“The first tranche will be people who’ve served less than two years but that doesn’t mean they haven’t committed very serious offences.

“Many of these offences will be violent offences and for many of them, it won’t be their first offences. So some of them will have been designated as a high risk of harm.”

Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood has insisted that terrorists, sex offenders or domestic abusers will not be released early.