UK lags avoid mobile phone jam

THE UK government has apparently rejected the use of mobile phone jammers to prevent mobile phones smuggled inside prisons being put to nefarious uses such as drug dealing.

The plan was rejected on the grounds that such jammers might interfere with handsets being used in cars outside the prison grounds.

The revelation came as the result of a Parliamentary question from Lady Hermon, an Ulster Unionist, to Maria Eagle, the Labour MP, on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

In the year to September 30^th 2007, prison officers had discovered a total of nearly 3,500 mobile phones with SIM cards, mobile phones without SIM cards and SIM cards on their own.

Prison establishments are required to send all seized mobile telephones to HMPS Security Group for investigation. Investigators hope the lags will have left behind some incriminating phone numbers.

Curiously, Wandsworth Prison seems to be the worst offender. Out of the approximate 1,500 phones recovered from all England and Wales jails in five months, one sixth of them (circa 250) were found inside Wandsworth nick. µ