Gangs flying zombie knives into prisons by drone, handing 'most dangerous men in the UK very unpleasant weapons'
14 January 2025, 09:38 | Updated: 14 January 2025, 15:51
Gangs are using drones to fly zombie knives to "the most dangerous men in the country" in prison, a watchdog has warned.
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Charlie Taylor, the chief inspector of prisons, told LBC's Nick Ferrari at Breakfast that drone deliveries of weapons and drugs were even being targeted at individual cells.
Speaking earlier, Mr Taylor said that the drone deliveries were a threat to national security, and that the police and government were guilty of giving up control of the airspace above HMP Manchester and HMP Long Lartin in Worcestershire.
His comments come after he published a damning report on Tuesday following inspections at the two prisons in September and October.
"The combination of the most dangerous men in the country and weapons getting into their hands just doesn't bear thinking about," the prisons watchdog told Nick.
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He said that drones had been used originally to deliver drugs and phones - but that the situation had escalated to weapons as well.
Mr Taylor said that drones were getting through in part because netting designed to stop them had broken, and CCTV cameras had broken and had not been replaced.
Prisoners have also been using elements from their kettles to burn through their cell windows to enable deliveries.
Another issue is the rubbish that isn't being cleared up from around prison estates. Sophisticated gangs can disguise a drone delivery in a rubbish bag, and leave it with other refuse.
An inmate behind the prison walls then identifies the right bag and hands out the contraband among the prisoners.
"So we don't know about half of the stuff that's getting into these prisons," Mr Taylor said.
Mr Taylor said he had spoken to a long-term prisoner who was "nervous" because he had seen a fellow inmate being stabbed with a zombie knife that had been brought into the prison via drone.
"In the past, you could normally stop this stuff," he said. "And prisoners, if they wanted to make a weapon, they had to manufacture their own sort of weapon from... a toothbrush or something like that.
"But what we're seeing now is the opportunity to be able to get weapons right into prisons. Properly designed weapons. And the risk that serious harm can be done to people in the jail, but also the potential for people to be able to escape."
He even warned that he was concerned about guns being flown into prisons.
"That's the biggest worry of all," he said. "And it's also the big worry for staff in these jails. I talked to officers and they said they just don't know. They'll open a cell door and they don't know what might have arrived the night before.
"So there's a level of nervousness, this is a paradigm shift in terms of the level of risk that staff in prisons feel that they're facing at the moment."
Labour said they had inherited the problem from the Conservatives but claimed to be "gripping the situation".
The scale of the problem at HMP Manchester, previously known as Strangeways, included inmates burning holes in windows to receive drone deliveries and prompted Mr Taylor to last year tell the Justice Secretary to put the prison into emergency measures.
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Mr Taylor said: "It is highly alarming that the police and prison service have in effect ceded the airspace above two high-security prisons to organised crime gangs which are able to deliver contraband to jails holding extremely dangerous prisoners, including some who have been designated as high-risk category A.
"The safety of staff, prisoners and ultimately that of the public is seriously compromised by the failure to tackle what has become a threat to national security.
"The prison service, the police and other security services must urgently confront organised gang activity and reduce the supply of drugs and other illicit items which so clearly undermine every aspect of prison life."
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) promised improvements including a crackdown on drugs after Mr Taylor found there to be "catastrophic levels" present at the category B prison in Manchester which can hold more than 700 men, including a handful of the "most disruptive" and high-risk prisoners under close supervision.
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"The number of weapons and other illicit items found in recent months was among the highest of all prisons holding adult men and the proportion of prisoners testing positive for drug use was very high at 39%," the report said.
Meanwhile, the findings on Long Lartin told of drones carrying "large payloads of illicit items" into the category A Worcestershire prison.
Holding almost 600 inmates, including those mainly serving life sentences and "some very dangerous men", the number of drugs and phones coming into the jail was a "serious concern".
More than 50% of prisoners told inspectors it was "easy" to get drugs and alcohol, which the watchdog branded an "astonishing rate" for a high-security jail, according to the report.
The latest warning comes after Mr Taylor likened another high-security jail, HMP Garth in Lancashire, to an "airport" because there were so many drones flying in drugs.
And a report from Independent Monitoring Boards (IMB) - made up of volunteers tasked by ministers with scrutinising conditions in custody - into "crumbling" jails in England and Wales said delays in fixing broken prison windows was making it easier for drones to be used to deliver drugs and weapons.
In December, MPs heard contraband was being taken into HMP Parc in South Wales in "children's nappies", while there were "industrial specification drone drops" from organised crime gangs.
Andrea Coomber, chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: "These appalling inspection reports are a warning that problems in prisons spill out into the towns and cities around them.
"A system that has been asked to do too much, with too little, for too long is now so compromised as to become a threat to national security."
Pia Sinha, chief executive of the Prison Reform Trust, described the infiltration of criminal gangs in prisons as a "serious and worrying development", arguing giving more power to governors to update security equipment and recruit staff as well as focusing on rehabilitating inmates would reduce demand for drugs.
An MoJ spokeswoman said: "This Government inherited prisons in crisis - overcrowded, with drugs and violence rife.
"We are gripping the situation by investing in prison maintenance and security, working with the police and others to tackle serious organised crime, and building more prison places to lock up dangerous criminals."
