Teenager given 18-month sentence still in prison 18 years later under IPP term

A desperate mother has spoken of her anguish after her teenage son was jailed for 18 months but is still trapped in prison 18 years later under a cruel indefinite jail term.

- AMY-CLARE MARTIN

Luke Ings was handed a controversial imprisonment for public protection (IPP) sentence for robbery and a fight in McDonalds aged just 17.

The jail terms were scrapped in 2012 amid human rights concerns, but not retrospectively – leaving almost 3,000 people languishing in prison with no release date.

His devastated mother Samantha, 57, said Luke, now 36, is trapped with “monsters” inside maximum security HMP Wakefield, which is home to some of Britain’s most serious criminals, having spent his entire adult life inside.

She fears unless the government takes urgent action he will not survive amid soaring rates of suicide and self-harm among IPP prisoners.

“It’s wrong, they need to sort this out,” she told The Independent. “I understand if they had murdered someone or raped someone. My son was in a fight in McDonald’s and a street robbery.

“He was 17 years old and my mum had died two weeks before that. He went off the rails. I don’t know what else to do to get him out.

“There is no light at the end of the tunnel for him,” she said, adding that things would have been far worse if not for the help of her late father, who sadly did not live to see his grandson’s release.

“I think if it hadn’t been for my dad, Luke would not be in prison now – he would be dead. He would have killed himself.”