Key question they won’t answer over trans rapist
We still don’t know WHY he was in female jail, says ex-governor
A ‘WhIteWASh’ review into how a trans rapist ended up in a women’s jail does not answer why it happened, a former prison chief has said.
Rhona hotchkiss, an ex-governor of Cornton Vale in Stirling, condemned the review of the Isla Bryson case. She also warned the current approach will mean that the mistake will be repeated.
It comes as the Scottish Prison Service refused to say whether any woman staff members had been put at risk by the decision to send Bryson – known as Adam Graham before changing gender – to all-female Cornton Vale.
SNP ministers were also criticised for more chaotic U-turns following a decision to ensure that all transgender prisoners are initially placed in a jail based on their biological sex.
Nicola Sturgeon faced criticism after the report into why Bryson was sent to a women’s prison was censored.
On the review, Miss hotchkiss said: ‘there doesn’t seem to have been reflection or questions asked about the thinking, the influences, the ideology that led the prison service to put a double rapist in Cornton Vale.
‘I would like to see what the brief was because we are no further forward in understanding how this happened.’
On transgender inmates going into a jail which aligns with their birth gender, she told BBC Good Morning Scotland: ‘Until we get ideology out of this, until we can have an honest discussion about the fact it is not possible to change sex, we will keep getting policies like this that lead to the kind of ridiculous situation we were in with this individual.’
Miss hotchkiss said it is ‘scary’ the review sets out that some transgender prisoners with a history of violence against women could go into the female estate.
She said: ‘there will no doubt be a case at some point where someone puts what they consider to be a good case for a violent or sex offender to go into women’s prisons and that is deeply worrying.’
the review said Bryson was put in a ‘separation and reintegration unit’ away from the general prison population and ‘at no time’ came into contact with any other prisoners’. the SPS confirmed that this means no women in custody were at risk but refused to say if any female staff were in close contact with Bryson.
tory community safety spokesman Russell Findlay said: ‘After a series of embarrassing and chaotic U-turns, Nicola Sturgeon still hasn’t got this right. the SNP are making it up as they go along and their new policy is a blatant con since it… leaves open the possibility they could still then be transferred to a women’s prison.’
he added: ‘the secretive SNP must publish the full report, not this highly selective whitewash review.’
A Scottish Government spokesman said: ‘Given the nature of the report, which has a significant amount of personal detail relating to the individual and that of staff, it would clearly not be appropriate to share it in its entirety.’