Government data reveals the number of prisoners mistakenly released more than doubled in the year to March 2025.
His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) reported 262 such releases between April 2024 and March 2025, a significant jump from 115 in the preceding 12 months.
HMPPS stated in its report that releases in error "remain infrequent", attributing the rise to legislative changes and Labour’s early release scheme, introduced in September 2024.
Thousands of inmates have been freed early since then in a bid to cut jail overcrowding, by temporarily reducing the proportion of sentences which some prisoners must serve behind bars in England and Wales from 50% to 40%.
A number of the 262 were released in error when the early release scheme began, HMPPS said, because of an issue with a repealed breach of restraining order offence.
