Inmates using hidden mobile phones to plot crimes outside

MOBILE phones are being discovered in Yorkshire jails at a rate of one a day and prisoners are thought to be hiding hundreds more to organise crimes from their cells.
By The Newsroom
Published 8th Apr 2010, 10:52 BST
Updated 8th Apr 2010, 10:59 BST

Although Government figures show at least 370 mobiles and Sim cards were found in the region's prisons last year, Ministers have admitted they do not know how many are being used.

Prison officers believe there are up to 2,000 and have called for mobile phone reception in jails to be blocked so inmates cannot order killings or arrange drug deals from inside.

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Statistics revealed by Justice Minister Maria Eagle show that the authorities found 4,461 mobiles and 4,325 Sim cards in prisons in England and Wales between February 2009 and January this year. Among them were 376 mobiles and 379 Sim cards in Yorkshire.

Prison Officers Association (POA) spokesman Glyn Travis said: "We believe that, nationally, there is one mobile phone, charger and Sim card for every 10 prisoners, which is absolutely ridiculous.

"If almost 400 have been found in Yorkshire prisons, the actual number being used is probably nearer 2,000."

Eight staff at Wakefield Prison, one of the region's top-security jails, have been suspended while authorities investigate allegations of phone smuggling.

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According to the Government's figures, a quarter of the phones found in Yorkshire were in Lindholme Prison, near Doncaster, and one in five were in Wolds Prison, in the East Riding.

Inmates in both jails have been able to orchestrate major crimes from their cells.

Lindholme prisoner George Moon used a contraband mobile and two Sim cards to run an international cocaine ring, liaising with a contact in a Panama jail to smuggle drugs worth 300,000 into the UK.

Gang leader Nigel Ramsey was a serving prisoner at Wolds when he used a mobile to orchestrate the murder of 17-year-old Tarek Chaiboub outside a Sheffield barber's shop in July 2008.

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A spokeswoman for the Prison Service said it was trialling technology that would block mobile phone signals but had found no "off-the-shelf solution".

MOBILES SEIZED BY PRISONS

Prison Mobiles Sim cards

Askham Grange 0 0

Doncaster 8 13

Everthorpe 54 47

Full Sutton 1 6

Hull 28 32

Leeds 45 58

Lindholme 97 82

Moorland Open 23 18

Moorland Closed 26 28

New Hall 0 0

Northallerton 1 1

Wakefield 0 0

Wealstun 20 27

Wetherby 5 4

Wolds 68 63

TOTAL 376 379

Figures for February 2009 to January 2010

Related topics:Yorkshire