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• Exclusive: Prisons inspector says strip searching and special cells for young offenders are over-used

Special cells designed to hold disruptive young offenders exist in 13 juvenile prison establishments, despite assurances from the Home Office last month that they are only evident in Stoke Heath Young Offenders Institution in Shropshire, writes Clare Jerrom.

In December, a Home Office spokesperson told 'Community Care' that the department was “as certain as we can be” that special cells were not being used by juveniles in other prisons.

Yet in answer to a written parliamentary question last week, prisons minister Paul Goggins admitted that juveniles had been held in the cells in the 13 different establishments on more than 150 separate occasions during 2003.

The special cell in Huntercombe YOI alone was used 46 times, the figures reveal.

The cells in Stoke Heath have no furniture or sanitation and are used to calm-down disruptive or violent offenders. Martin Narey, the chief executive of the new National Offender Management Service, admitted in a letter to the Howard League for Penal Reform when he was director general of the Prison Service that children in these cells would be stripped of their clothes if its retention “would pose a threat”.

But current director general Phil Wheatley insisted children are not naked in the cells. The Howard League believes children are likely to be provided with a jacket and blanket, although the charity fears forcibly stripping children who are likely to have a history of sexual abuse or violence is likely to “traumatise” the child.
 
Goggins did not specify how long children were held in the cells, but he said they would be used “for the temporary confinement of a violent or refractory prisoner and not as punishment”. He added that as soon as the justification for the use of the special cell ceased, “the young person will be moved from that accommodation”.

Although a Home Office spokesperson insisted last month that the cells are used for “typically a few hours”, the League’s director Frances Crook said children have told the charity they have been held in the cells “for several days”.

The charity is offering to carry out an independent investigation into the cells using their lawyers and bringing in the help of children’s charities and social services.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “All of the cells referred to are the cells which these establishments used for the temporary confinement (ie a calming measure) of a violent or refractory prisoner and not as punishment. As soon as the original justification for the use of the special accommodation has ceased, the young person will be moved from that accommodation.

She said: “As soon as the original justification for the confinement has ceased then so the confinement ends. Usually measured in a small number of hours, only very rarely and very exceptional cases would it be longer.”