A British man sentenced to 17 months in prison for threatening to kill a former partner during a heated row is still behind bars more than 10 years later.
Jason Thorne, 43, of Cardiff in Wales, is still in prison because he was jailed under a sentencing regime called IPP – Imprisonment for Public Protection.
It is no longer used because UK Government Ministers came to the conclusion it was unjust, according to the Mirror newspaper.
However, although IPP has been abolished for new prisoners, it is still in place for those who were given IPP sentences at the time of their conviction.
Jessica Ross, 35, a friend of Thorne’s, is campaigning for his release.
She said: “He has done his time several times over and has got lost in the system.
“He can’t understand why he is still in prison when there is no question of his being a danger to the public.”
She said Thorne had recently been in an open prison leading up to his release but had been returned to a closed prison.
Ross added: “He accepts that he should not have made the threat to kill, but it was one of those things said in the heat of the moment when he was very upset.”
Thorne’s solicitor Bill Cordingley said: “We have a number of prisoners still in jail on IPP sentences, and Jason’s case is the worst in terms of the length of time he has remained in jail.
He said that IPP sentences were introduced in 2005 for people who were considered to be a potential danger to the public.
“The intention was largely to protect people from sex offenders and those guilty of very serious crimes, but sometimes judges used them in less serious cases.”