'Shameful' lack of secure beds led to prisoner killing himself, says coroner
assessment while he was in the unit and prison officers, healthcare staff and doctors knew or should have known he was under a “real and immediate risk of self-harm or suicide”.
The jury found Bailey’s death could have been avoided if observations had been properly carried out, if he had been given appropriate medication and if placed under constant observation.
The verdict said a lack of trained and experienced staff and effective management at the unit created an unsafe environment to hold Bailey and that he should have been transferred to a healthcare unit once he showed signs of psychosis.
The five-week inquest heard Bailey, who was serving a four-year sentence, suddenly changed from being a fit, confident, articulate young man to being subdued and quiet in the days before his death.
He was placed on suicide watch following “strange” behaviour, taking his clothes off in the exercise yard and reciting the Lord’s Prayer. His mother Caroline said she tried to express concerns after noticing marks on her son’s neck on a visit on March 22. Nothing was done and the father-of-one was found dead in his cell on March 24.
The inquest heard the Category B prison, run by private company GSL, had problems with “illicit items” being brought in. After the death, the chief inspector of prisons found it was “an unsafe and unstable environment”.
