Jail may turn 'lower-level' terror offenders into attackers, Parole Board warns

Sentencing Council could raise punishments for offences like spreading terrorist material online and fundraising for extremists

Westminster attacker Khalid Masood is believed to have been radicalised in prison (Metropolitan Police)

Increasing prison sentences for people convicted of low-level terror offences could make them a higher security threat in the long term, the Parole Board has warned.

In a consultation over new guidelines being drawn up by the Sentencing Council, the authority pointed out that specific risk assessments are not carried out for terrorists being “spread around the prison estate”.

The Parole Board warned that radicalisation within prisons was likely to continue and increasing penalties for less serious offenders – like those found guilty of spreading terrorist material online – could “result in them becoming more likely to commit terrorist acts when they are released”.

“Most of the rest of Europe is devising interventions in the community to deradicalise less serious offenders,” it said. “These programmes are more likely to be successful in the community than in prison where the influence of extremist inmates is likely to be stronger.”

Khalid Masood, the Westminster attacker, is among the extremists believed to have been radicalised in prison.

He first appeared on MI5’s records for contact with known terrorists less than a year after serving his last of several prison sentences in 2003, having left jail a convert to Islam.

The so-called “crime-terror nexus”, which sees criminals drawn into violent extremism, is a well-documented phenomenon in Europe.

Leading members of the Isis cell that launched the 2015 Paris attacks had been imprisoned together for petty crime and Harry Sarfo, a German Isis militant who grew up in the UK, told The Independent how he “learned the ideology of jihad” after being jailed for robbery.

After considering the Parole Board’s submissions, the House of Commons Justice Committee said sentencing strategy must be part of a wider approach to prevent terrorism and said non-custodial punishments should be considered.

“If deradicalisation provision in prisons is in fact absent or inadequate, as we have reason to believe is often the case, then this must have an effect on the Sentencing Council’s assessment of the likely efficacy of sentences,” it said, noting that jail terms are meant to reform and rehabilitate offenders and reduce crime, as well as deterring it.

“We suggest that concerns about the adequacy of deradicalisation programmes in prison may mean that the court should consider, for certain offences at the lowest level, whether it would be appropriate to impose a non-custodial sentence.”

The Sentencing Council is currently consulting on draft guidance on terror offences in England and Wales that was first published in October.

Expected to be published next month, they are designed to equip courts for the “new category” of terrorists, whose plans escalate rapidly and involve attacks using cars or knives.

The main proposed change applies to offences under section five of the Terrorism Act 2006, which covers the preparation of terrorism.

The new guidelines will keep the same maximum sentence of life with a minimum term of 40 years, but the council could set the sentencing range for the lowest level at three to six years – compared with the current 21 months to five years.

“Preparation” includes a wide spectrum of activity, from an advanced terror attack plan, to intending to travel to a war zone or helping others.

Punishments for crimes including the encouragement of terrorism, fundraising and supporting a banned organisation could also be increased, sparking concern over the impact on Britain’s strained prison system – which is already seeing record levels of violence and self-harm.

The Government is separately examining whether sentences for terror-related offences are sufficient as part of a major review launched in the wake of five attacks that killed 36 victims in London and Manchester last year.

Ministers have already announced a proposed rise in the statutory maximum sentence for collecting terrorist information, from 10 to 15 years, to clamp down on those who repeatedly view illegal material on the internet.

There were 213 individuals in custody in Britain after being charged with or convicted of terrorism-related offences at the end of September, a rise of more than a quarter on the previous year.

Separate figures suggest that authorities are managing more than 1,000 inmates identified as extremist or vulnerable to extremism at any one time.

Last year the Ministry of Justice launched three specialist units to hold up to 28 prisoners after a review concluded Islamist extremism was a growing problem in jails.

Conservative MP and barrister Bob Neill, chair of the Commons Justice Committee, said experts had warned that “there might be a risk of backlash effects outweighing the gains” of harsher sentences for lower-level terror offences.

“Notwithstanding understandable public opprobrium in the face of recent terrorist atrocities, we consider that it is important to maintain a proportionate approach to sentencing that preserves judicial discretion, irrespective of the ideological drivers of these offences,” he said.

Additional reporting by PA