Source · SPSO (Scottish Public Services Ombudsman)

Scottish Prison Service

SPSO (Scottish Public Services Ombudsman) Upheld Reference 201200440 Sector Prisons Category personal property Decided 01 October 2012

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Original decision on the SPSO (Scottish Public Services Ombudsman) website ↗

Full decision

Summary

Mr C, who is a prisoner, complained that the prison inappropriately issued his mail to another prisoner. The prison investigated Mr C's complaint and confirmed that his mail had been given to another prisoner in error.

Our enquiries with the prison confirmed that steps had been taken to carry out a thorough investigation after Mr C complained. The prison identified that this had happened because of human error rather than a systemic failure. Unfortunately, they were unable to locate Mr C's missing mail but they had apologised and carried out retraining for staff on the process of issuing prisoners' mail.

We upheld Mr C's complaint. However, because of the appropriate steps taken by the prison to investigate the matter, their apology to Mr C and the efforts taken to retrain staff, we did not make any recommendations.

Related reading

View Decision Report 201200440 as a PDF (11.06 KB) Updated: March 13, 2018

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