Its just a matter of time before a prison guard is killed: Ex-governors warning after Southport murderer Axel Rudakubana, 18, hurled boiling water over jail officer
A prison officer will be murdered unless frontline staff get better protection, a former governor warned yesterday after another violent attack behind bars.
A prison officer will be murdered unless frontline staff get better protection, a former governor warned yesterday after another violent attack behind bars.
Professor Ian Acheson took aim at the culture of ‘appeasement’ of dangerous criminals following an assault at Belmarsh high security prison when Southport triple killer Axel Rudakubana allegedly threw boiling water at a guard.
It is understood the 18-year-old was able to boil the water in a kettle in his cell and throw it through a hatch.
Staff were alerted by the guard’s screams and he was treated at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich. He was discharged after being treated for minor injuries and will return to work next week.
The attack comes just weeks after Manchester Arena terrorist Hashem Abedi, 28, threw boiling oil over three guards in a segregation unit at HMP Frankland in County Durham.
He then stabbed them with ‘homemade weapons’, leaving them ‘millimetres’ from death. Police have opened an investigation.
Rudakubana is serving 52 years for killing Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Bebe King, six, at a dance class in July last year.
Serious assaults on prison officers increased 19 per cent in a year according to Home Office figures.
Southport killer Axel Rudakubanu (pictured) is alleged to have hurled boiling water over a prison guard
The 18-year-old triple murderer reported carried out the attack at HMP Belmarsh (pictured) in Thamesmead, east London, where he is serving a life sentence
Professor Ian Acheson (pictured) is a former prison governor who says the balance in UK prisons has become completely skewed, particularly at Belmarsh, in favour of the rights of prisoners against the harm they might pose to prison officers
Professor Acheson, who led an independent review of Islamist extremism in prisons, called on the Prison Service to put staff protection above prisoners’ rights.
He said: ‘A prisoner having a kettle is not a human right, especially when it could be used as a weapon by somebody who is dangerous.
‘There is a forest of red flags accompanying this wretched young man and, given that, I cannot see any reason why he would have been provided with anything other than food and drink delivered to his cell, because the risk he poses is serious and very obvious.
‘There has been a recent escalation in violent attacks and it is reasonable to conclude that we are closer to the murder of a prison officer on duty than ever before. That is a real and significant prospect and is one which the Prison Service is ignoring.
‘The balance has become completely skewed, particularly at Belmarsh, in favour of the rights of prisoners against the harm they might pose to prison officers.
‘That balance is dangerously out of whack and needs to be restored.’
It is believed that Rudakubana was in a cell in Belmarsh’s healthcare centre when the attack happened.
A prison source said it was ‘unsurprising’ he was in that wing because the nature of his crime and his life sentence would put him at high risk of self-harm.
Rudakubana was jailed for life after launching an attack on a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport last July, in which he murdered Bebe King (left), Elsie Dot Stancome (middle) and Alica da Silva Aguiar (right)
Rudakubana has been caged on the same secure unit as Manchester Arena terrorist, Hashem Abedi (above), who assaulted prison guards in HMP Frankland last month
A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: ‘Violence in prison will not be tolerated and we will always push for the strongest possible punishment for attacks on our hardworking staff.’
But former prison governor Professor Acheson branded the statement as ‘delusional, hopeless boiler plate rubbish’ adding: ‘Not only is it tolerated, it is normalised. People running the Prison Service always talk about overcrowding, but none of these high security prisons are overcrowded – none of them. Something else is going on.
‘And I believe that something else is the completely inappropriate appeasement of very dangerous prisoners by leadership who are effectively throwing their frontline staff under the bus.’
When Abedi, jailed for life for helping his brother carry out the 2017 suicide bombing, attacked the prison officers at Frankland, they were equipped with only extendable batons and cans of incapacitant spray.
He was moved to Belmarsh and is being held in the same segregation unit as Rudakubana.
A Scotland Yard spokesman said: ‘The Met is investigating after a prison officer was subject to a serious assault at HMP Belmarsh.’