A female prison officer who sent more than 4,000 flirty messages to a prisoner has been sentenced to a year behind bars.
Toni Cole, 29, was convicted of sharing 4,369 intimate messages with a scammer at Northamptonshire's new 'super-prison' HMP Five Wells.
Cole appeared for Northampton Crown Court and also appeared to participate in 18 video calls with the prisoner while he deals with 'contact that was sexualized or flirtery'.
The court also heard how the 29-year-old would be on the prisoner's lap and kiss him, and even occasionally warned him of cell examinations in advance.
The violations took place between December 9, 2022 and January 25, 2023, before Cole's misconduct was discovered by bosses in the Category C Prison.
Cole argued guilty of misconduct in public office and was instructed to pay a surcharge of £ 187 in addition to her one year in prison.
She is the second officer in the same number of years to be convicted of misconduct in a public office in the same Wellingborough Jail.
Last summer, Rachel Stanton, 31, received a conditional punishment after he was involved with her own prisoner.
Toni Cole (photo) was sentenced to a year in prison after he was found guilty of misconduct in a public office
Toni Cole was convicted of sharing 4,369 intimate messages with a con in Northhamptoneshire's new 'super-prison' HMP Five Wells (photo)
The trainee officer, who is a mother of five, turned out to have been romantically involved with armed thief Edwin Poole.
On that occasion, the prison staff found a number of intimate images and a love letter in the cell of Poole, where CCTV also catches the couple that a prison storage will arrive for more than an hour.
Stanton was suspended after the discovery of their relationship in July 2022 and Poole was moved to another prison. She continued to visit him and the loved ones now have a child together, but have since separated.
In addition to Cole and Stanton, a third female prison officer, who is not identified, was arrested and suspended for similar infringements.
The news of Cole's conviction comes in the midst of increased control aimed at G4S, the operators of the new £ 253 million facility.
Inspectors recently expressed concern about the safety of staff, the presence of drugs in prison and potential food shortages.
An inspection in the well -being of the prisoner at HMS Five Wells last December showed that levels of self -harm had increased and that not enough was done to tackle violence or bullying.
The inspection also showed that G4S had appointed his fourth director in the facility in just two years, which had further emphasized the challenges for the prison.
Concerns were also made about the inexperience of the staff, with more than 70 percent of the officers working for less than two years.
HMS Five Wells (photo) has seen three employees involved in inappropriate relationships with prisoners since the opening in 2022
Prison guard Rachel Stanton (photo) admitted the intentional misconduct in a public office after she had entered into a relationship with armed thief Edwin Poole
Last month, the post on Sunday exclusively revealed that the number of prison officers who had sex with prisoners is increasing sharply.
In figures obtained from the Ministry of Justice, 19 prison staff were accused of misconduct in public office between 2023-24, in what the highest numbers were in more than ten years.
The figures also show that a total of 121 prison officials have been accused of making inappropriate relationships with prisoners in the past decade.
The post on Sunday also revealed that nearly 5,000 officers had been accused of a whole series of other violations in the past decade, ranging from helping prisoners to smuggle drugs in cells.
Figures from the Ministry of Justice also revealed that 2023-24 saw the largest number of officers in the last decade that for any other year, with 680 cases registered.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice said to the post: “The vast majority of our prison officers are honest and hardworking. We will always take robust action against those who are not. '
