Police in London have launched a manhunt after a 24-year-old Algerian man was mistakenly released from Wandsworth Prison nearly a week ago.
According to the Metropolitan Police, they were notified by prison officials on Tuesday that the prisoner had been released in error six days earlier, on Wednesday, 29 October. Efforts are now underway to locate and return him to custody.
A spokesperson for Prime Minister Keir Starmer described the incident as unacceptable, adding that the circumstances surrounding the mistaken release would be forensically investigated.
The prisoner’s immigration status remains unclear, but Shadow Defence Secretary James Cartlidge told the Commons that police were searching for an asylum seeker.
The revelation came as Cartlidge questioned Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy during Prime Minister’s Questions about whether any asylum seekers had been wrongly released since the case of Hadush Kebatu, a jailed migrant sex offender mistakenly freed from HMP Chelmsford last month.
Lammy declined to give details, noting that a review led by Dame Lynne Owens was ongoing, but said the government had imposed the toughest ever checks on prisoner releases since the Kebatu incident.
Government data shows that mistaken prisoner releases are becoming more frequent. According to the latest figures, 262 prisoners were released in error across England and Wales in the year leading up to March 2025, a 128% increase from 115 the previous year. Of those, 233 were freed from prisons and 29 through court errors.
The prison service described such releases as infrequent, but attributed the rise to “a range of operational and legislative changes.”
