The Christmas season hasn’t been able to distract people from Labour’s controversial policies for long. The controversy surrounding the early release of prisoners this year is still causing problems for Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour party. To make matters worse, the criminals who were released early aren’t doing anything to reassure the public.
For example, Isaac Donkoh, a gang member and drill music artist also known as Young Dizz, was released under Labour’s new prisons policy. This is surprising because the policy was supposed to exclude people convicted of serious violence from early release. However, Donkoh was released despite being convicted of kidnapping and torturing a 16-year-old boy, which the police chief described as “extremely violent”.
Donkoh was initially sentenced to 12 and a half years in prison for his crimes. After his release, he took to social media to announce his freedom and has even released a Christmas song celebrating his early release. In the song, he raps about raising the crime rate and mocks Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
The Prime Minister has defended the early release policy, saying that there was no choice due to overcrowding in prisons. However, the release of Donkoh and 37 other inmates who were wrongly released in September has raised serious questions about the competency of the new government.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson has said that the new government inherited a prison system on the brink of collapse and had to introduce an emergency early release scheme. The spokesperson emphasized that serious violent and sexual offenders were excluded from the scheme and that those released were subject to strict license conditions. However, this hasn’t reassured the public, and the issue is likely to continue causing problems for Labour in the future.