Jail let-off for prison nurse in affair with ‘monstrous’ inmate
A PRISON nurse who fell for a “monstrous” inmate has been spared jail after a judge branded their romance a “tragic love affair”.
Ashleigh Naylor began the affair with Paul Lane while he was serving 12 years for an attack on an Iraq veteran who described the trauma of the beating as being “worse than the horrors of war”.
Soldier Christopher Hall, 43, who was entirely innocent in the street attack, was left temporarily blinded in one eye and with a deep gash across his head which may have been caused by a bottle, a court was told in 2012.
But after being caged at Holme House prison, in Stockton-on-Tees, Lane, 33, met and fell in love with prison nurse Naylor, 30. When he was released earlier this year the love-struck couple moved in together at Naylor’s home in Skelton, near York.
Teesside Crown Court heard the romance began illicitly behind bars.
After Lane was moved to Kirkham open prison near Preston just before his release in October 2017, Naylor visited him 35 times.
When prison guards investigated they found more than 400 photos of the blonde nurse stashed in his cell.
She also passed him pay-as-you-go codes to enable him to use a phone that had been illegally smuggled into the prison.
The fling was discovered during a drunken night with a colleague when she blurted out her secret.
Naylor admitted aiding and abetting the unauthorised possession of a device in prison and was given a 12-month jail sentence, suspended for two years.
Judge Peter Armstrong told her: “This was a genuine relationship with the two of you falling in love.
“Prison officers on very rare occasions can be corrupt and be put under enormous pressure by prisoners. It is a somewhat tragic story.”