HMP Lowdham Grange

What we found

Inspectors found that the number of use of force incidents had trebled, the number of violent incidents had increased, and the rate of self-harm was the third highest among category B training prisons. Compounding this was the ingress of illicit drugs, with 56% of surveyed prisoners saying it was easy to get hold of them, and 40.6% testing positive in random drug tests in the previous 10 months.

Since the last inspection in 2023 there had been 10 deaths in custody, four of which were suspected of being attributed to drug misuse. A very high number of medical emergencies were linked to drugs, yet health services were no longer providing round-the-clock care, were not meeting the needs of patients, and in some cases were unsafe. The prison’s response to recommendations made by the Prison and Probation Ombudsman and local learning reviews was also inadequate and not all incidents of self-harm were being recorded. Prisoners listed the inconsistency in the regime and prison systems, difficulty maintaining family ties and an inability to see health professionals as some of the triggers for self-harm.