As an ex-jail guard, I’m astounded how easy it is for inmates to walk out of prison…

…but Ava Vidal, a stand-up comedian who worked for five years as a prison officer at HMP Pentonville, can tell you exactly why prisoners are being freed by mistake with surprising regularity – as she looks back on her time when a jailbreak required ingenious planning rather than an administrative error

For the second time in a fortnight, a police manhunt is underway– this time for Brahim Kaddour-Cherif, a 24-year-old Algerian sex offender previously convicted of indecent exposure who had been serving a sentence at HMP Wandsworth for trespass with intent to steal. Until, that is, he escaped.

Except, he didn’t escape. It appears that prison staff simply opened the gates and let him out.

The same went for 35-year-old convicted fraudster William Smith, who was released by mistake from the same jail – the same day he had been sent down with a 45-month sentence. After three days at large, he handed himself back in this morning, with a smile to the awaiting cameras.

Before I became a stand-up comedian, I spent five years as a guard at HMP Pentonville, a large, overcrowded category B and C facility that holds more than 1,200 men and young offenders, and the now-closed women’s prison, HMP Holloway. So I know how excruciating it is for the staff when inmates escape. After all, you had one job…

However, I’m astounded at just how easily inmates are getting out these days.

Last month, Ethiopian asylum seeker Hadush Kebatu – who had sexually assaulted a 14-year-old girl and a woman while staying at the Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex – was mistakenly released from Chelmsford prison, prompting a 48-hour manhunt for him in London, where he was spotted wandering about. He has since been deported.

Brahim Kaddour-Cherif had been sentenced to an 18-month community order but, having also overstayed his visa, was in the early stages of the deportation process. Perhaps prison officers believed he had also overstayed his welcome at their nick.

As for William Smith, the police helpfully advised the public that he goes by “Billy”, as opposed to his full name. I suppose this was in case people see the famous Hollywood actor of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air fame wandering around Selfridges, bulldoze through his bodyguards and tackle him to the floor in a clumsy citizen’s arrest.

So how does the prison system get itself into this situation in the first place? You’d think all staff would be on high alert and checking paperwork repeatedly to make sure this didn’t happen again so soon after Kebatu last month.

People mistakenly think that prisons in the 21st century are all high-tech and have doors that open and snap shut with the click of a button. Or that inmates press their palms onto a computer scanner and undergo an iris scan prior to being released. It couldn’t be further from the truth. In many of our Victorian prisons, staff have to manually get up and slide the gates open.

Officers have to go through copious amounts of paperwork by hand, which is probably how these prisoners were released by mistake in the first place – simple clerical error.

It happens with surprising regularity. HMP Chelmsford, a category B men’s prison, was in the news earlier this year when inmate Junead Ahmed fooled officers into thinking he was due for release by forging High Court paperwork. Imagine that – a convicted fraudster committing… fraud. And he would have got away with it, too, if he hadn’t tried to free two other inmates using the same trick.

Brahim Kaddour-Cherif and William Smith both escaped from HMP Wandsworth after they were released by mistake (Metropolitan Police/Surrey Police)

When I used to patrol the landings, most escapes would take place outside the prison estate, due to the lack of security. Hospitals were a favourite. No one wanted to do “bed watch” for this reason. An inmate would feign an illness and use the chance to break free from his cuffs and do a runner. Prisoners were supposed to be manacled to an officer with a closeting chain unless doctors ordered it to be removed for an examination, after which it was put right back on again.

Former home secretary Ann Widdecombe was famously under fire from human rights groups when she defended the policy of keeping female inmates chained until they were in labour. The idea was they’d probably not attempt to run while fully dilated with their baby crowning. Many described it as “inhumane and degrading”. However, she had a point. One of my female inmates once jumped from a first-floor window during an antenatal appointment. In another incident, a male prisoner who was diagnosed as completely paralysed jumped up and ran away as soon as his bed watch was withdrawn.

There is nothing more embarrassing for an officer than returning back to the prison with a chain dragging on the floor, without an inmate attached to it. You’d have to do the walk of shame and no doubt be greeted by the kind of cheer normally reserved for the barmaid who drops a glass in a crowded pub.

In 2017, convicted murderer Shaun Walmsley faked a bowel condition and lost weight in order to secure a hospital visit from HMP Liverpool. While at Aintree University Hospital for an endoscopy, two armed accomplices helped him escape by threatening prison officers. He was on the run for a full 18 months before being recaptured.

Sometimes, you didn’t even make it to the hospital. Earlier this year, another inmate escaped from a prison van by faking an “onboard medical emergency”. The van was forced to pull over, and he overpowered the escorting officers and fled.

We would have to search underneath all of the vehicles going in and out, in case an inmate was doing their best Spider-Man impression and hanging underneath. Maybe these days they don’t tell you to check inside the vehicle as well – which is exactly how Daniel Khalife, the former British soldier turned Iranian spy who sparked a 75-hour manhunt in 2023, escaped.

I remember one of the questions in my interview for a job at HMP Holloway was: “Which TV show do you think is more realistic – Prisoner: Cell Block H or Porridge?” (The correct answer is Porridge, by the way.) But I wonder if, these days, they ask potential recruits to the profession not about the Ronnie Barker sitcom or the Australian soap about the lives of inmates and staff at a high-security women’s prison, but the more contemporary hit US TV series Prison Break.

The main character is Michael Scofield, who helped design the prison in which his brother Lincoln is being held. He had the blueprints tattooed on his body and got himself incarcerated in order to free his sibling. It all seems a little far-fetched now. Why go through all of that when you can simply open the gate and let them out?