Prison officer found not guilty of assault

Our client, a female prison officer working in a male prison, was found not guilty after trial of assaulting a prisoner. Our client’s defence was one of self-defence. She had never previously been in trouble with the law and did not have any previous convictions. This not guilty result means that she maintains her good character. 

It was alleged that our client had wrongly assaulted a prisoner by headbutting him in the face. The evidence in the case included multiple angles of CCTV footage of the incident and a witness statement from the prisoner himself. Our client was suspended from working at the prison after this incident. 

Our client had only had several months on the job. She was only one of two staff working on a wing with around 20 prisoners. During the time of the incident, her colleague had to deal with another prisoner and could not assist her in putting the prisoners back into their cells. The last prisoner, who was the alleged complainant in this case, was not co-operating. It was our client's case that when she finally got him to get near his cell, he stepped threateningly towards our client whilst she was opening his cell door, and our client defensively headbutted the prisoner to keep him away from her. 

We had multiple conferences with our client to prepare her case. Our work included obtaining numerous character references. We also prepared defence witness statements of prison officers who were working at the same prison during the time. We invited the witnesses to Court and they attended in defence of our client.

After a trial in the magistrates' court, our client was found not guilty of this offence. 

Our client commented:

“just want to thank you all for getting the result we did in court. The day was handled well and I was talked through the whole day when Jon arrived. I also appreciated someone from the office turning up for support too. And your video call explaining the defence and what was required of me.”

Annie Loh acted in this case. Amy Cox supervised over the course of the case. Jonathan Duffy of 7 Harrington Street Chambers was the instructed barrister.