Highpoint inspection report 2020
Report for Highpoint Prison
Summary
It was concerning to find that for the third successive inspection many of the fundamentals of rehabilitation and release planning were not in place. The population was complex, with around a half presenting a high risk of harm and some 150 being associated with organised crime groups. Despite this, there were serious weaknesses in work to ensure that the public was properly protected. The details of these weaknesses are set out in this report, but include an obsolescence of too many OASys reports, too few probation officers to manage high-risk prisoners and a lack of communication between offender supervisors in the prison and community-based offender managers. In addition, there was not a systematic and reliable process for ensuring that all high-risk prisoners approaching release were reviewed to ensure there were no gaps in risk management planning. Over and above these issues, there were some weaknesses in basic public protection work, potentially allowing contact between prisoners and victims.