No Way Out

Foreign national women, many of whom are known to have been trafficked or coerced into offending, represent around one in seven of all the women held in custody in England and Wales. Yet comparatively little information has been produced about these women, their particular circumstances and needs, the offences for which they have been imprisoned and about ways to respond to them justly and effectively. This Prison Reform Trust briefing, drawing on the experience and work of the charity FPWP Hibiscus, the Female Prisoners Welfare Project,  and kindly supported by the Barrow Cadbury Trust, sets out to redress the balance and to offer findings and recommendations which could be used to inform a much-needed national strategy for the management of foreign national women in the justice system.