THE ASIAN INDEPENDENT UK
Bal Ram Sampla
Geopolitics
The Death of Sundeep Ghuman
In February 2020, Sundeep Ghuman, a British Indian Sikh man, from Erith Kent died at HMP Belmarsh prison. He was not killed by illness or accident. He was beaten to death by his cellmate, Steven Hilden, a known racist gang member. He was beaten to death by wooden leg. This was not just a tragedy. It was a preventable failure.
The facts are shocking. Hilden had told prison officers at multiple facilities that he was a member of a racist gang that carried out attacks in South London. His prison records clearly showed warnings about violence and racism. Despite all this evidence, when officers completed the Cell Share Risk Assessment, they marked him as “standard risk.” This meant he could be placed with anyone, including Sundeep Ghuman.
A jury at the November 2025 inquest found that Sundeep was unlawfully killed and that Hilden was a racist. They also concluded that if the risk assessment had been done properly, Sundeep’s death could have been avoided. The Chief Prisons and Probation Ombudsman compared this case to the 2000 murder of Zahid Mubarek, another young man killed by a racist cellmate due to institutional failures. Twenty years later, the same mistakes were still being made.
A System Under Pressure
The death of Sundeep Ghuman shows what can happen when prison systems fail at their most basic duty: keeping people safe. But this is not an isolated incident. British prisons are failing in many ways, and recent events show a system that is struggling to function.
In the past year, there has been a dramatic increase in prisoners being released by mistake. Between April 2024 and March 2025, 262 prisoners were wrongly released from prisons and courts in England and Wales. This is more than double the 115 released in error the year before. That means roughly five prisoners are accidentally freed every week.
Why Are Things Going Wrong?
There are several reasons why these errors keep happening, and they all point to a system in crisis.
First, prisons are dangerously overcrowded. The prison population has more than doubled since 1990, but staffing and buildings have not kept up. Victorian-era prisons built for far fewer inmates now hold far more than they were designed for. Wandsworth prison, built in 1851 for fewer than 1,000 prisoners, was housing over 1,500 by 2024.
Second, the prison workforce is inexperienced. More than half of prison officers in March 2025 had been in the job less than five years. A quarter had less than two years of experience. These relatively new staff members face enormous pressure, with large caseloads and limited training.
Third, the technology is outdated. Prison staff have to calculate complex release dates by hand using calculators and sort through boxes of paperwork because computer systems have failed to work properly. .
Fourth, overcrowding creates dangerous conditions. There were more than 30,000 assaults in prisons in 2024, roughly one for every three prisoners.
Are Prisons Fit for Purpose?
Given these failures, it is fair to ask whether British prisons are fit for purpose. The answer depends on what we think that purpose should be.
If prisons exist to keep the public safe, they are failing. Dangerous prisoners are being released by mistake. Known violent racists are being placed with vulnerable prisoners. Conditions are so chaotic that staff cannot account for where all inmates are during the day.
If prisons exist to reduce crime by rehabilitating offenders, they are failing. When prisoners are locked up for 18 hours a day with little access to education or work programs, when buildings are crumbling and violent, when drugs are widespread, rehabilitation becomes almost impossible.
What Needs to Change?
The problems are clear. The solutions are more difficult but necessary.
Prisons need proper investment in buildings, technology, and staff. Computer systems must work reliably to calculate release dates accurately. Staff need better training and support, especially given how many are new to the job. Risk assessments, particularly for cell sharing, must be taken seriously and completed properly every time, with proper oversight.
But investment alone is not enough. The prison population itself needs to be reduced to sustainable levels. Overcrowding makes every other problem worse. Consideration should be given to alternatives to short prison sentences for some offences, better mental health support to keep vulnerable people out of prison, and earlier intervention to stop people from committing crimes in the first place.
Most importantly, there needs to be accountability. When a young man like Sundeep Ghuman dies because officials ignored clear warnings about his cellmate, someone must be held responsible. When prisoners are mistakenly released by the dozen, the system must be reformed, not just given additional paperwork to complete.
Conclusion
The death of Sundeep Ghuman and the recent wave of mistaken releases are symptoms of the same disease: a prison system that has been neglected for years and is now failing at its most basic functions. Prison officers work under impossible conditions with inadequate resources. Prisoners live in dangerous, inhumane environments. The public is at risk when dangerous offenders are released by mistake.
These are not just administrative errors or unfortunate accidents. They are the predictable results of decades of underfunding, overcrowding, and neglect. Until the fundamental problems are addressed, tragedies like Sundeep Ghuman’s death will continue to happen, and prisoners will continue to be released in error.
References
1.https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/comment/prison-release-error-symptom-criminal-justice-system
2.https://theweek.com/crime/why-are-so-many-prisoners-being-released-by-mistake
3.https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/prisoners-released-in-error/
4.https://uk.news.yahoo.com/erith-man-beaten-death-known-170000473.html
