Telegraph: Trans criminals in women’s prison despite Supreme Court ruling

[KnottyAuty]

"Ministers have admitted that five trans women – biological men – are being held in the E Wing of HMP Downview in Surrey, despite concerns they could pose a risk to female prisoners."

How on earth is this still happening?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/e347f087f61e4bc2

https://archive.is/ockdQ

Sorry to post such a pointless reply, but I've just googled it to see where it is and google says "Closed, open 2pm Thursday. No reviews".

From what's reported earlier in the article this seems a flat out lie

“This is a separate unit for transgender prisoners, isolated from the main female population and only has access to the wider prison’s regime under exceptional circumstances following robust risk assessments and they are subject to constant direct supervision,”

Staff shortages mean the one to one supervision is often not possible.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice confirmed that although trans prisoners were separated, in some circumstances they may join supervised activities, but only after a rigorous local risk assessment.

Mmn. I remember the 'rigorous risk assessments' about putting men in women's prisons that turned out to be solely and exclusively about whether there was any risk for the man. Women weren't even an after thought. So this is about as reassuring as having a man in a position of serious responsibility who thinks men can grow cervixes.

Good point. And how does one ‘risk assess’ a violent or abusive male criminal as being safe to interact with vulnerable women? Do they have to pinky promise to behave?

I think these ‘risk assessors’ should be encouraged to picture themselves having to interact with these men without any of the power/safety structures that may currently give them a feeling of invulnerability.

Forcing women to associate with men that pose a threat to their safety when such a huge proportion of them have suffered serious abuse at the hands of men is unbelievably cruel.

The Ministry of Justice have been in the pockets of extreme transactivists for many years. They used to (may still) have very special secret meetings with trans lobby groups to decide which sex offending male offenders they were going to inflict on women. They had policies and protocols eagerly enforced by the transactivists within.

Always seemed an irony that the MoJ were completely unable to have effective policies for pregnant women prisoners resulting in baby deaths but were (and evidently remain) over keen on wedging male sex offenders into women's prisons. Again it speaks to the type of person running all this.

Always seemed an irony that the MoJ were completely unable to have effective policies for pregnant women prisoners resulting in baby deaths but were (and evidently remain) over keen on wedging male sex offenders into women's prisons. Again it speaks to the type of person running all this.

That’s such a good point.

Exactly, it demonstrates the degree of careful, deliberate capture.

In transactivism, it is a sin to permit women personhood. They cannot be viewed or discussed as people with feelings or needs or issues because that risks the desired goal.

This is downright wicked.

Doesn't Downview house young offenders as well as adult women?

Times reports there is still no intention to remove these men and the local MP is concerned. This is appalling https://archive.is/ZqG3V and https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/biological-men-still-in-hmp-downview-womens-jail-despite-trans-ruling-6r25bncws

Not surprised at all. Some in the MoJ are obsessed with extreme transactivism and the idea of wedging men into women's prisons, undermining the SC judgement is like catnip to them. Rinse and repeat in the NHS, education etc.

It's a sign of the "lanyard classes" inflicting on the most vulnerable their preferred luxury beliefs. It won't change until these people are publicly held to account.

When there's a distinct group of offenders inside a prison, it does create administrative problems. I used to do voluntary work inside our local prison, which had a men's unit and a women's unit. There were no men inside the women's unit, but in the men's unit there was a separate wing for sex offenders, who were under a different protocol.

From the Telegraph report, it doesn't look as if the men are incarcerated in cells with women. It looks as if any mixed-sex activities are limited and thoroughly supervised. Transwomen who look very feminine or who have had bottom surgery would indeed be at real risk in cells with other men. To me it's totally reasonable to keep them separate.

In an ideal world there would be a separate prison so that they wouldn't be in with women at all, but given the real world capacity for prisoners, it looks as if there is a concern for safeguarding for both women and transwomen. I don't believe transwomen are women, and from the Telegraph account it looks as if the prison authorities don't believe that either.

No. The women's safety is completely ignored, to protect men who have had completely unnecessary medical procedures for no good reason. This is not the women's problem and literally ignores the human rights of all women in prison, this is cruel and unusual punishment for them. Disgusting

It also highlights how little women and childrens rights matter compared to mens.

This was a government question last May when there were 7 prisoners. By the time of the Telegraph article last September there were 5. Anyone seen an update?

https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2025-05-02/50012/

Then safeguarding for male prisoners needs looking at doesn't it, considering TW are men. Anybody with an iota of intelligence knows that many male prisoners will have a horrific time in prison. My son, for example who is a kind, sensitive, non aggressive boy wouldn't last a day in prison, though luckily I've brought him up to respect others and the law.

My point being, why do TW get special treatment? Yes of course they're going to have a difficult time, but so do both other male and female classes. This is one of the many reasons people get pissed off, because of the special treatment they get, the way they shove others needs aside to gratify their own.

*prisoners, not classes, don't know where that came from.

Exactly! If the TIMs needs special care in with women then what about the young men, vulnerable men, old men, sick men…. It’s ridiculous

That's the problem when you stop separating categories of people into their base characteristics.

Women are not human shields for men. Women have legal rights (yes, even in prison) and the women who are in prison are more likely to have been abused, to have been in care, to be BAME, to be poor. Who on earth would be cruel enough to force them to be imprisoned with men just to help with a management problem? This is only a viable solution if you think that men count and women don’t.

I don’t think TW should be in with the women. I do think that they probably need some protocol that guards their safety, which is a thing that prison authorities are responsible for. Sex offenders are given separate accommodation and treatment in the one prison I have experience of, but I don’t know if that’s the case in other prisons.

I have visited prisons for work. I can tell you that prisons are very different depending on the sex of the inmates but being in either one is terrible. There should be NO men in women’s prisons ever. 80% of women in prison have suffered a head injury from violence, the vast majority of that violence will have been male. No matter what ‘work’ a trans identified male may have had, they are still men.

I do understand that TIMs will be vulnerable if put into a general environment in a male prison but that doesn’t mean that women should be used as human shields.
My daughter’s year in primary school had a large cohort of ‘difficult boys’. The girls were used to dilute the issue, by putting the calm girls between the boys. The girls were bitten, punched, sworn at. Now imagine they were adults, adult women who had been damaged by men. Think of the fear level.

It wasn’t right in that school and it isn’t right in prison.