URGENT & IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED: Imminent Threat to Life, FireSafety Failures, and Toxic Exposure at HMP Eastwood Park

SOUTH GLOUCESTERSHIRE, UK — February 20, 2026 — The Feminist Justice Coalition (FJC) has today issued an urgent legal ultimatum to the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), and South Gloucestershire Council: Evacuate the Main House block of HMP Eastwood Park by 5:00 PM on Monday, February 23rd, 2026, or face immediate action for statutory neglect.

The FJC warns that 150 incarcerated women and the prison staff working on the Main House block (rez 5 and 6) are in immediate, life-threatening danger due to catastrophic fire safety failures and extreme environmental hazards.

Ongoing Inquest Highlights Systemic Failure & Wasted Funding This crisis reaches a breaking point as the ongoing inquest at Avon Coroner’s Court continues to examine the death of Claire Dupree, a Welsh woman who died in December 2022, two days after a vape set fire to her cell at HMP Eastwood Park. According to evidence provided by Peter Hayworth from the prison, he told Avon Coroner’s Court that the jail had been bidding for money to upgrade the fire detection system after an inspection found the fire panel in Ms. Dupree’s block was obsolete, and after Governor Short successfully had this prison categorised as complex and drew down several million pounds of public funding for repairs to the structure and fabric of the prison.

The FJC asserts that Governor Short has wasted this money by replacing cheap plyboard furniture in women’s cells with exactly the same cheap plywood furniture. The only difference is that the new furniture has no doors or drawers; so in fact, she has replaced functional items with less functional items, while life-saving fire infrastructure was left to fail.

Despite this tragic precedent and public admission of failure, the FJC reports that conditions have deteriorated further:

• Zero In-Cell Fire Alarms: 150 women are held in cells with no internal fire alarms. The only detection is via battery-operated alarms in corridors, which are reportedly never checked.

• Toxic Carcinogenic Exposure: With the central heating broken for seven years, an external oil generator is pumping carcinogenic diesel fumes through wall perforations into unventilated cells. The windows do not open, trapping these fumes inside.

• Vulnerable Women at Risk: These toxic fumes are being inhaled by women with confirmed cancer diagnoses on Row 6. Both inmates and officers report severe nausea, lightheadedness, and chronic headaches.

• Infrastructure Collapse: Hot water was non-existent from Monday, 16th February, until late Thursday, 19th February, leaving women to suffer in extreme heat or extreme cold with no ability to regulate cell climates.

“This is an impending disaster. We are watching the systemic neglect of 150 women—many of them Welsh women like Claire Dupree, held far from home—who are trapped in toxic, freezing, and fire-prone conditions,” a spokesperson for the Feminist Justice Coalition stated. “Evidence provided by Peter Hayworth from the prison demonstrates authorities knew their systems were obsolete. To waste millions in public funding on downgraded plywood furniture while continuing to lock women in unventilated cells without fire alarms and pumping in carcinogenic fumes is an unconscionable violation of the right to life.”

The gravity of this systemic failure was underscored at the ongoing inquest by Barrister Nick Armstrong, who is representing Claire Dupree’s family. Addressing the facility’s safety measures, Armstrong stated: “All the things you rely on for the protection of life, there are issues with.”

We are sending this to the Avon Coroner’s Court and to Nick Armstrong, who represents Claire Dupree’s family at the inquest. One hundred and fifty women’s lives are in danger right now and absolutely no one seems to care.

Perhaps we should organize a protest outside the prison and a vigil for Claire Dupree, and also for the five women with serious cancer diagnoses who have no access to fresh air or healthy food, and who routinely miss staging scans because the GP, Dr. Emma Mastracola, is lazy and incompetent. Furthermore, the Head of Healthcare, Kelly Smith, is a jumped-up administrator who is putting women’s lives at risk.

We are not going to sit back and watch while this disgusting Governor, Zoe Short, lets more women die because she is abusive and sadistic. Help us remind her—and all these people—that they are public servants and that our taxes pay their wages. Please let us know if you would like to help us organize a vigil outside HMP Eastwood Park. Help us ensure that this place is shut down before more women die unnecessarily. Join us so that Claire’s death is not just another death in custody, where these ‘punishment for profit’ organizations can just wring their hands in dismay and pretend that lessons will be learned while we know nothing will change.