1990 Strangeways Prison riot courts, hangings, castrations and that between eleven and twenty prisoners had been killed. On 3 April the front page of the "Daily Mirror" read "Prison Mob 'Hang Cop' ", and claimed a former policeman imprisoned at Strangeways for rape had been killed by prisoners. The newspaper was forced to publish a retraction admitting that "reliable police sources" had been mistaken, when it transpired that the man was actually alive and imprisoned in HM Prison Leeds. Following the end of the rooftop protest the newspapers condemned the prisoners, with "The Daily Telegraph" describing the riot as "a degrading public spectacle", and
HM Prison Lewes 10 April 1852, Sarah Ann French was the last female to be hung at the prison for her crime of murdering her husband William French, the murder known in East Sussex as the Onion Pie Murder. In October 2003, after 25 to 30 prisoners were involved in a riot just before nightly lock-up that led to property damage and the injury of an officer, officials launched an inquiry. In 2016 there was a riot lasting 6 hours when cells and offices were damaged, prison officers forced to retreat to safety. Mike Rolfe of the Prison Officers Association blamed severe staff