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Jailed asylum seeker at centre of protests accidentally released
The Guardian
|October 25, 2025
A former asylum seeker who sexually assaulted a woman and a 14-year-old girl near an asylum hotel in Epping, leading to nationwide protests, has been accidentally released from prison, causing a police manhunt.
Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu was accidentally let out of prison prompting a manhunt in mid Essex
(ESSEX POLICE)
The Ethiopian national Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu was jailed for 12 months in September for sexual assault and made the subject of a five-year sexual harm prevention order.
The 41-year-old was meant to be sent to an immigration detention centre to be deported but was accidentally freed by mistake, it has emerged, and police in Essex are now urgently trying to find him.
The deputy prime minister, David Lammy, was said to be furious and “appalled”, and had ordered an investigation, a source said.
A prison service officer has since been removed from duties to discharge prisoners while an investigation is carried out.
Lammy was supporting police efforts to find Kebatu, who was found guilty of committing two counts of sexual assault and one of attempted sexual assault in July, days after arriving in Britain on a small boat and taking up residence at the Bell Hotel in Epping.
This story is from the October 25, 2025 edition of The Guardian.
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