Inmates at Britain’s first ‘respectful’ jail have been given the keys to their cells – with prison officers having to knock before entering. Wrexham’s HMP Berwyn, the largest prison in England and Wales, says the move is a ‘rehabilitative’ approach to offenders. Prisoners have been given more privacy, with the ability to come and go from their cells as they please – as well as being able to lock themselves in at any time. The ‘knock first’ policy is aimed at creating a respectful environment...

By Tess de la Mare, Belfast Telegraph Digital, January 2, 2020 The traumatic histories of offenders stuck in the prison system should be treated as a public health issue to break cycles of offending, psychologists working with inmates have said. But despite the often complex histories of violent offenders, in the UK’s squeezed prison system there are limited resources available for rehabilitation. Forensic psychologist Dr Naomi Murphy runs a five-year intensive psychotherapy programme for...

A new report from the Prison Policy Initiative shows that the populations of local jails are swelling for reasons that have little to do with crime. State prison rates have come down modestly overall, reports the Sentencing Project , and some states can boast double-digit decreases since the turn of the century. City and county jails, meanwhile, have been bloating. Roughly two-thirds of states have seen jail populations at least double since 1983 a dozen have seen jail populations triple.