Labour in crisis as two more prisoners freed by accident

A sex offender who was in Britain illegally is being hunted by police after he was accidentally released from jail just days after a similar blunder left an asylum seeker on the streets.

- AMY-CLARE MARTIN KATE DEVLIN

In a fresh crisis for Sir Keir Starmer’s government, it emerged that Brahim Kaddour-Cherif, 24, had been wrongly freed from scandal-hit HMP Wandsworth in London. That came moments after the deputy prime minister David Lammy repeatedly failed to answer questions in the Commons on whether there had been another mistaken release since the Epping hotel migrant Hadush Kebatu was wrongly freed last month.

The justice secretary later admitted he had been informed on Tuesday night of the hunt for the Algerian national, who is serving a sentence for trespass with intent to steal, but has previously also been convicted for indecent exposure. It then emerged that another inmate had been wrongly freed from the same prison. Surrey Police are now hunting for Billy Smith, 35, who is linked to the Woking area. He was sentenced to 45 months for multiple fraud offences, the force said.

The Conservatives hit out at what they described as a “full-blown crisis” as they accused Mr Lammy of trying to “hide the truth” and demanded to know how many prisoners had been accidentally released and how many were still at large. Kaddour-Cherif is understood to have entered the UK legally on a visit visa in 2019, but overstayed and was in the early stages of the deportation process. He was given an 18-month community order and placed on the sex offenders’ register for five years. The Metropolitan Police said the criminal had a “six-day head start” after he was freed from the medium-security jail last Wednesday, but the force was only informed at 1pm on Tuesday. The force released footage of the offender and appealed for the public’s help to track him down.