‘I was like a hostage. After almost 18 years on an indefinite jail term, they finally admitted my IPP sentence was wrong’
Exclusive: Haroon Ahmed, whose indefinite jail term was quashed in the Court of Appeal, says IPP prisoners are ‘hostages’ who have grown from teenagers to men watching more dangerous offenders be released, Amy-Clare Martin reports
In prison, Haroon Ahmed was told to keep his head down and never question the indefinite jail term he was serving for robbery.
He was part of a generation of persistent young offenders who had racked up a string of convictions before they were handed a controversial Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) jail term.
He was told he would serve a minimum of two-and-a-half years for his role in a knifepoint raid on a Derby service station in 2008, when he was 19, which left the manager unhurt but badly shaken.
But when that time was up, a letter was pushed under Mr Ahmed’s cell door. A Parole Board panel – whom he had never met – had decided he must serve at least another two years before they would consider his case again.
He spent almost eight years behind bars before he was even afforded an in-person hearing by the Parole Board. It was 12 years until he was released for the first time, but he was returned to jail indefinitely a year later after he was convicted of actual bodily harm.
In frustration, he escaped several times – including a high-profile incident in 2015 – each time landing himself in more trouble with the courts. He says he was “fighting the system” as he refused to accept the reality of an open-ended sentence.
However, as he matured behind bars, the narrative began to change. IPP jail terms were scrapped amid human rights concerns about how they were implemented and a growing number of voices were seeing the open-ended punishments for what they were – a serious injustice.
Inspired to finally make his voice heard, he decided to challenge his sentence in the Court of Appeal. And last November, aged 37, judges finally admitted that they made a mistake.
After almost 18 years of “hell”, he returned home to Derby a free man after judges quashed his sentence.
Now he is calling for the government – which has resisted widespread calls to resentence almost 2,500 inmates still languishing on the abolished jail terms – to take responsibility for their actions.
He told The Independent: “It was their mistake. And I would like them to take responsibility, because I had to for my offending. I had to for the wrongs I did.”
As a child, Mr Ahmed rebelled against his strict family and fell into petty crime. He left school in Year 7 and was first jailed aged just 12, when he was sentenced to four months in a young offenders’ institute.
“From there it was a downward spiral for me,” he said. “I wasn’t listening to anyone, and I started to become a problem in the community and with my family. I found myself in and out of custody throughout my life until I received my IPP in 2008.”
Although his accomplice, who was holding the knife in the robbery, was spared an IPP and handed a five-year determinate sentence, Mr Ahmed was initially told by his lawyer that there were no grounds to appeal his tougher punishment.
Feeling increasingly bitter and angry, he railed against the system, escaping from several prisons and frequently getting in trouble with the prison authorities. He now describes this as a form of self-harm, which kept him in prison longer.
He said: “You’ve given me a sentence where I’ve technically got no release date. What can you actually do to me? So if I see a way out, I’m gonna take it.”
But he added: “They never understood that most of that behaviour that I was actually doing to myself, the escaping, the violent acts, was a form of self-harm.”
After his first escape in 2011, he was transferred to a high-security prison. Those years, he said, were, ironically, the best of his prison life as he finally got an education and completed his GCSEs and A-levels.
In the beginning, it was drilled into him to stop questioning the open-ended jail term he was serving. But as the years passed, concerns about the legacy of the abolished sentence grew louder.
Successive governments have described it as a “stain” on the justice system, but refused recommendations from the cross-party justice committee to resentence those still trapped indefinitely. To date, at least 94 people have taken their own lives in prison after losing hope of getting out.
In 2023 Mr Ahmed realised he could submit an application to the Court of Appeal using forms printed off in the prison library, which he filled in himself.
Watching his appeal hearing via video link from HMP Oakwood in Staffordshire last year, Mr Ahmed said he felt like he was back in 2008 as he listened to lawyers in a London courtroom rehash the details of the robbery all over again.
At one point, he feared he was going back to his cell. But the ruling by Mr Justice Soole and Lord Justice Popplewell concluded: “Having considered all the material which was before the Judge, we respectfully conclude that the imposition of the sentence of second last resort on this young applicant was not justified.”
The judges quashed his IPP jail term, replacing it with a five-year prison sentence, which he has already served, and a five-year licence period.
As he waited for his release paperwork to reach the prison, he began to feel angry.
“I started to feel a bit of hatred towards the system because I am actually a victim,” he added. “The highest judges in the country have told me that it’s been removed – I want to go home.”
Now he wants to support other IPP prisoners to challenge their jail terms, especially as drastic cuts to legal aid funding in 2013 made it harder for prisoners to access support.
“We are basically hostages,” he said. “We have grown from teenagers to men, and we are watching people with much worse offending come to custody and be released.
“Every sentence is being reduced – people are getting 30 per cent off, 40 per cent off. Nothing is coming for IPP. We just sat there and supported each other.”
Without government action to help those still languishing in prison, he fears more prisoners will take their lives in despair.
He says the Prison Service never offered him or other IPPs any support and simply led them on by continually giving them goal posts which kept moving.
“To have that stress, to have parole hearings… I have seen some people 10 years later and they are not the same. They are smoking synthetic drugs, they are self-harming, they are killing themselves, they have lost family members. They don’t see any hope.”
He credits his positive mindset with helping him get through the 18-year ordeal. He wants to show others: “If I can do it and come out and be successful, then other IPPs can.”
The UN has condemned the jail terms as “psychological torture” and 233 IPP prisoners are serving their sentences in secure hospitals, in many cases because the hopeless nature of the jail term has left them profoundly damaged.
Mr Ahmed supports proposals put forward by the Howard League for Penal Reform for all remaining IPP prisoners to be given a release date within two years at their next parole review.
He said: “I think two years is a long, long time, but it’s better than nothing. In that two years, you can start to feel the weight off your shoulders. You can start to adjust to going home.”
He added: “Let them go home, let them let their families know that something is happening. Let everyone just put this to the side now and get it over and done with.
“Until then, you are still causing trauma and you’re still causing torture – because this has been classed as a torture sentence. So, every day that they keep these prisoners in there, without something set in stone, is a form of torture.”
Prisons minister James Timpson has insisted the government is supporting IPPs to progress towards release by the Parole Board with a refreshed IPP Action Plan.
But Mr Ahmed says he was never offered any meaningful support.
“The prison didn’t do anything,” he added. “I never saw any IPPs getting any support.
“It was only before I got out that I was approached and asked if I wanted to join an IPP forum. No, you can’t come to me 18 years later and offer a forum. I feel like it’s disrespectful. I feel like it’s a tick box for the Prison Service.”
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “It is right that IPP sentences were abolished and we have already taken action to support these offenders to move on with their lives.
“This includes additional support for IPP prisoners and changing the law to ensure those serving these sentences in the community can be more swiftly considered for licence termination.”
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