Downing Street has admitted it is “not possible” to exempt one or two individual offenders from Labour’s early release regime, deepening pressure on Prime Minister Andy Burnham over plans that could see the killers of PC Andrew Harper freed early.
Jessie Cole and Albert Bowers, who were convicted of manslaughter over the 2019 death of the Thames Valley Police officer, are eligible for release after serving half of their 13-year sentences.
The admission represents a significant setback for ministers who had been examining options to prevent the pair from leaving prison in January.
Burnham had previously pledged to explore “every option” to keep the men behind bars, amid mounting anger from police officers and Harper’s family.
But government officials have warned that creating an exemption specifically for Cole and Bowers would be vulnerable to legal challenge because there is no separate offence covering the manslaughter of an emergency worker.
The problem exposes the wider difficulty confronting Labour as it attempts to tackle severe prison overcrowding without allowing serious offenders to return to the streets prematurely.
Ministers are understood to have considered changing the rules for offenders convicted of manslaughter, but such a move would potentially affect hundreds of prisoners rather than the two men at the centre of the controversy.
That leaves Downing Street facing an increasingly uncomfortable choice: accept the release of Harper’s killers, or redesign the wider early-release framework in a way that could create new legal and capacity problems.
The government has previously warned that the prison system is operating under extreme pressure. Blocking large numbers of releases without creating additional capacity could leave prisons unable to accept newly convicted offenders.
The Harper case has nevertheless become politically toxic because of the circumstances of his death. The 28-year-old officer was dragged for more than a mile by a vehicle while responding to a burglary in Berkshire in September 2019.
Cole and Bowers were convicted of manslaughter after prosecutors failed to secure murder convictions.
For Burnham, the case now presents a test of whether his government can demonstrate that its commitment to easing prison overcrowding will not come at the expense of public confidence in the justice system.
The admission from Downing Street suggests the Prime Minister’s promised “every option” may already be narrowing.
A Whitehall source said: “There is no way to make an exception for them without extending it to everyone convicted of manslaughter.”
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