Shoplifter back behind bars four days after early release from Wandsworth

A man freed from HMP Wandsworth under the government’s early release scheme has been jailed again after admitting shoplifting offences he committed in the days after he got out.

Michael Bogle, 38, walked free on 1 October with the first wave of prisoners let out under the plan. Over the next four days he stole more than £100 worth of detergent from supermarkets in north London. Police arrested him on Tuesday. He pleaded guilty in court on Wednesday and received an eight-month sentence.

Bogle had originally been given a 32-week suspended sentence and was jailed after breaching its terms. He served 78 days of it before the early release. Outside the prison on the day he left, he described conditions inside as “awful” and said “people like me” should not be locked up “for a long time”. When asked for a message to Prime Minister Andy Burnham, he said: “Keep the early release going. It’s good.”

Met officer’s letter on early release reoffending

Det Ch Supt Luke Williams, the Met’s most senior commander in north-west London, set out the case in a letter to local politicians sent on Wednesday. He did not name Bogle. The letter was later shared by Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp.

According to Williams, the probation service had identified the man as a high-risk offender, yet he was caught on CCTV stealing a day after his release. Supermarket staff then reported further thefts, and neighbourhood officers spent a full day tracking him down and bringing him into custody.

Williams said the speed of the reoffending and its effect on front-line policing was “astonishing”. He put the bill for the case at £1,887, covering 27 hours of officer time.

He told MPs and councillors that the Met recognised the government faced significant pressure in the prison system. Those pressures, he said, were being “transferred on to policing with no recognition”, and officers across London were dealing with similar cases.

Why the early release scheme was brought in

Ministers introduced the scheme because prisons in England and Wales were dangerously close to full. A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said the government had inherited a prison system on the brink of collapse, and that without action police would have had to stop arresting people. The ministry said it was funding thousands more neighbourhood officers and raising police funding to £18.5bn. It added that offenders let out early on licence faced strict controls, including exclusion zones and wider use of electronic tags.