HMP LEEDS holds nearly 500 prisoners above its capacity with 91 per cent of cells containing more men than they were designed for, a new report has revealed.

The findings were contained within Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons’ report on the Armley site released today, which branded the Victorian prison “seriously overcrowded”.

It also found that seven inmates had died since 2015, including one during the period the jail was being inspected.

The report assessed HMP Leeds as being “unsafe with high levels of violence”, the same rating as when deteriorating standards had been found during its previous inspection on December 2015.

When inspectors returned unannounced in October and November last year, they found no improvement in safety, respect, and rehabilitation for prisoners, and a further decline in their work, education, and training.

The prison was described as “one of the most seriously overcrowded in the country”, with its 1,127 inmates 458 above its ‘certified normal capacity’ of 669, an overcrowding rate of 68 per cent.

Transgender Keighley woman Vikki Thompson, 21, was found dead at HMP Leeds in November 2015, and inspectors found that hers was one of four self-inflicted deaths at the prison since that time.

The report stated that another such death occurred while inspectors were at the jail, with an apparent homicide and another self-inflicted death recorded in the days after the visit ended.

Inspectors also found that the Armley site had a problem with drugs, with more than 60 per cent of prisoners claiming it was ‘easy’ to get hold of such substances.

The report did note positive improvements at the prison, highlighting an “energetic and focused” leadership team and quality work involving rehabilitation and release planning, with one local charity set up by two former prison staff, Tempus Novo, found to have placed 132 men into work in the last three years.

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Peter Clarke, HM chief inspector of prisons, said: “It was particularly concerning that, yet again, we found Leeds to be an unsafe prison, with our assessment of the area of safety being a very clear ‘poor’.

“Levels of violence of all kinds were far too high. Not only did prisoners feel no safer than at the last inspection, the harsh reality was that they were indeed less safe. Violence, self-harm, and the use of force were all high. Several staff had been suspended or dismissed for misbehaviour when using force.

“Despite our troubling findings on safety, there were some cautious grounds for optimism. Unlike far too many local prisons, Leeds had not slipped dramatically backwards in terms of its performance in recent years. While it had not managed to buck the trends in violence and the prevalence of drugs that have afflicted much of the wider prison estate, neither had it experienced the shockingly high levels of increase seen in many other prisons.

“If HMP Leeds can become a safer place in which to hold prisoners, there is no reason why it should not make progress in other areas and show a much stronger performance at the time of the next inspection.

Michael Spurr, chief executive of HM Prison & Probation Service, added: “Levels of violence, self-harm, and drug-use at HMP Leeds are too high. But decisive action is being taken to tackle the issues. A specialist intelligence unit has been set up and the prison is working with the police to target drug suppliers.

“Body-worn cameras are now in place to support staff in reducing violence and we have strengthened incident management and recording systems. The Governor and staff at Leeds are committed to improving the performance of the prison and will use the recommendations in this report to drive progress over the coming months.”

Andrew Neilson, director of campaigns at the Howard League for Penal Reform, said the report highlighted that “bold action” to help reduce the prison population was “inescapable”.

He said: “There is surely no clearer illustration of the dangers of prison overcrowding than this report on Leeds. It is almost impossible to comprehend the scale of the chaos in a jail where 91 per cent of cells are holding more people than they are designed to accommodate.

“Most worrying of all is the tragic fact that, within the space of 23 months, six men in Leeds have lost their lives through suicide and a seventh has died in an apparent homicide. If this grim reality does not compel the government to act, it is hard to imagine what would.”