A reformed ex-prisoner who was recalled to jail for missing an appointment with her probation officer 20 years ago can today be revealed as a mother-of-three who had left the UK for Africa.
Rebecca Lansari was forced to serve an additional three months in jail earlier this year over a missed probation meeting in 2005 following her release from an 18-month sentence for cheque fraud.
The 44-year-old met her Tunisian husband Hassib Lansari in 2013 and moved to the north African country to start a new life together.
Her three children, Luca, 18, Naima, 11, and Aissa, nine, live in Tunisia, while Ms Lansari would fly back and forth to work in the UK where wages are higher.
However, her life unravelled in March when she flagged up as a ‘most wanted’ person at Gatwick Airport and was thrown in HMP Downview.
Ms Lansari says she has lost her job and is not permitted to return to her children Tunisia until January.
The mother-of-three is raising money to launch a legal battle, writing on GoFundMe: ‘My life was almost perfect, I was working and paying tax, contributing towards society and now I have absolutely nothing.’
She added: ‘My children are with my husband, their father, in Tunisia but they all financially rely on me too, causing me more worry and stress being unable to not only provide for them but also be with them.’
Ms Lansari conceded she was wrong to miss probation but claimed she ‘tried handing myself in’ and contacting the Ministry of Justice, her local MP and the Prison and Probation Service.
She continued: ‘I’m now 20 years later paying for the incompetence of public authorities that should have done their job properly then.
‘I’ve not offended in the 20 years and I’ve completely changed my life around, all of this has set me back 20 years and made me lose everything in my life all over again.
‘I am going to push things as far as I possibly can in the hope that no one ever has to endure the pain and suffering I have been through as well as my children and husband.’
The incident happened within the last 12 months but has only now come to light as the Independent Monitoring Board suggested it was a poor use of stretched resources when many prisons are full to breaking point.
Inspectors found the jail in Banstead, Surrey, was transferring women to an open prisons as a ‘knee-jerk, short-term’ solution to population pressure.
However, their report noted: ‘We monitored the case of a woman who was transferred to Downview on recall for just 12 weeks. The recall was for a breach of a licence condition (failure to attend her probation appointment), which had taken place 20 years prior to her recall to Downview.
‘The woman had not committed any further offences in that time and was now a mother, with school-age children and secure employment.
‘She lost her job in the community while in Downview and was not allocated any work or other activities during her time in the prison.
‘We query whether this is a sensible use of a prison place in the middle of acute population pressure, and also of His Majesty’s Prison Service resources generally.’
The report also stated there is a ‘large churn’ of prisoners at the jail, meaning more women coming and going through its doors – meaning many couldn’t be given the attention they needed by prison workers.
A HM Prison and Probation Service spokesperson said: ‘In an extremely rare situation, this woman was unlawfully at large since 2005 and we are reviewing the circumstances behind it.’