Report into deaths in jail calls for women's prisons to be closed | The Guardian | Guardian Unlimited

Report into deaths in jail calls for women's prisons to be closed | The Guardian | Guardian Unlimited: "Report into deaths in jail calls for women's prisons to be closed


Alan Travis, home affairs editor
Wednesday March 14, 2007
The Guardian

Ministers should set up a timetable within six months to close down existing women's prisons and replace them with a local network of small custodial units reserved only for those who are a danger to the public, according to a Home Office-commissioned report published yesterday.

The radical approach is recommended as a result of a nine-month review of the position of vulnerable women in the criminal justice system carried out by the Labour baroness Jean Corston. It was ordered by the former home secretary Charles Clarke in the face of demands for a public inquiry following the deaths of six women at Styal prison in Cheshire."