Five prisoners serving indefinite sentences referred for appeal

Five prisoners serving indefinite sentences have been referred to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), BBC Newsnight has been told.

Despite being abolished in 2012, there are still 2,800 prisoners serving open-ended sentences, which were issued to people deemed dangerous but whose offence did not merit a life sentence.

Many on Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentences have served longer than the minimum tariff they were originally given.

Interim chair of the CCRC Dame Vera Baird told Newsnight that the five IPP prisoners were all men who remained in custody after originally being sentenced between 2002 and 2010 when they were in their late teens.

She said the Court of Appeal had shown "a bit of a change" in its attitude, recognising that "young men like these were when they were sentenced are very different from mature men".

A change in legislation has also been made to ensure those serving IPP sentences in the community could be more swiftly considered for an end to their period on licence, according to the Ministry of Justice (MoJ).

Matthew Booth, 34, told Newsnight he received an IPP sentence when he was 15 years old, following his conviction for wounding with intent and unlawful wounding.

He originally served more than six years in prison for those convictions, but was recalled four times for breaches in his IPP license conditions. One such breach included being in a relationship that he did not declare.

"I don't think any child should get IPP because of what you go through," he said, speaking for the first time since his release from prison last week.

He continued: "You're just feeling like there's no help. There's no hope. It just takes a toll on you. It changes you. That's what's building up inside of you, in your character."

Dame Vera echoed his words, noting that IPP sentences assessed people for what they might do, rather than what they had actually done.

"These are sentences which just bring people into hopelessness," she said.

An MoJ spokesperson said it was: "Right that IPP sentences were abolished and we have already taken action to support these offenders to move on."

The government announced in November last year that it would automatically pardon grooming gang survivors, where people were convicted or cautioned as children for loitering and soliciting for prostitution offences.

Dame Vera revealed it had referred its first "grooming gang victim... to try and get her conviction quashed".

She appealed for people to "come forward", adding the CCRC was "working with charities which help post-grooming people to get over their trauma and they are going to find out for us if they've got a conviction because we need people to come forward".