Drug-smuggling prison nurse to speak on podcast

Amy Hatfield was jailed for more than 10 years for her role in a drugs conspiracy at HMP Lindholme

A woman at the centre of one of the UK's biggest prison drug-smuggling scandals has spoken out about her affair with an inmate and role in the conspiracy.

Amy Hatfield, a former mental health nursing assistant at HMP Lindholme, had a forbidden relationship with inmate Joseph Whittingham which led to the Doncaster prison being "flooded" with drugs.

She told the BBC podcast Gangster Presents: Sex, Drugs & Cell Block Parties that Whittingham "liked the thrill of it" and would tell her to "just be a risk-taker".

The 40-year-old was jailed for more than 10 years after she was caught attempting to smuggle more than £1m worth of drugs into work, including Ribena bottles filled with spice.

The nursing assistant, who has since been released from custody, carried items into the prison, including MDMA, cannabis, steroids and mobile phones, and would arrange fake mental health appointments to hand over packages to inmates.

'From the horse's mouth'

On the podcast, Hatfield tells investigative journalist Amber Haque how until her arrest in 2019, she communicated with Whittingham through an illegal mobile hidden inside the prison.

"At the start we just talked about going away together, weekends away, just spending time with families… but it didn't turn out that way," she said.

"He said we could make some money before he gets out. Obviously, I shouldn't have crossed the boundary, but I did."

Hatfield, formerly of Hawthorne Street in Barnsley, said "a lot of stuff" had been written about her and people should hear the story "from the horse's mouth".

Judge Kirstie Watson told Hatfield at her sentencing at Sheffield Crown Court in 2023 that the affair was a "significant breach of trust and abuse of position".

She said Whittingham had been able to "exploit" Hatfield to smuggle drugs because she was "infatuated" with him and hoped they would set up a life together after his release.

He died at HMP Woodhill in Milton Keynes earlier this year, according to the Prisons & Probation Ombudsman, and an investigation into his death is in progress.

Hatfield was "infatuated" with Whittingham, a court heard in 2023

In total, 17 people were jailed for their roles in the conspiracy, which police said was the largest and most complex ever seen in the UK.

They including five prison inmates, relatives and friends who helped get weapons and drugs including heroin, MDMA, spice, ketamine and cannabis into the prison and launder the profits.

Knives, mobile phones and prescription drugs were carried in by Hatfield, where they would sell for up to 10 times their usual value.

Toxicology tests found spice recovered from her matched a batch which killed an inmate, Kyle Batsford, in September 2019.

Drug use had spiked in Lindholme after she began working there in September 2018 and fell again after her arrest, the trial heard.

She was handed a 10-year and two-month sentence and Whittingham, from Bradford, was jailed for 11 years and four months.

Gangster Presents: Sex, Drugs & Cell Block Parties will be available on BBC Sounds on 14 November.

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