A married prison officer who had a secret six-month romance with a serving inmate and sent him sexually explicit selfies has been jailed for 12 months.
Jade Morris, 37, exchanged more than 10,000 messages with inmate Jerome Nunes, 35, during their intimate relationship between July 2022 and January 2023. Morris was working at category A HMP Long Lartin in Worcestershire, home to some of Britain's most notorious criminals, while drugs dealer Nunes was serving a 12-year sentence.
How the affair was uncovered
The pair's fling was exposed after prison chiefs became suspicious when Nunes threw an encrypted mobile phone from his cell window during a search. Police later uncovered thousands of messages on WhatsApp and Snapchat exchanged by the pair, along with a string of raunchy photos.
Officers also found a letter written by Nunes to Morris which confirmed the pair had been involved in an intimate relationship. Mum-of-two Morris, of Holmer, Herefordshire, had been going through a divorce with her husband at the time, who was serving in the Armed Forces.
Court proceedings and sentencing
She pleaded guilty in March to misconduct in a public office and to encouraging Nunes to use an illegal phone and was jailed at Birmingham Crown Court.
Sentencing, Judge Peter Carr said: 'You, Miss Morris, had been working at the prison since January 2022; you were fully aware of your responsibilities and the occupational actions you engaged in.'
'Mr Nunes was a prisoner serving a long sentence. It was soon established that there was a wrongful relationship between the two of you. Mr Nunes tried to hide the evidence of your phone when your cell was searched in October 2022 but it was recovered. It was an encrypted device, so the contents were unavailable, but the authorities were able to establish the phone number of that device.'
Speaking to Miss Morris, the judge added: 'The messages you sent included images of you and, using Snapchat, going back to July 2022. There were many calls and over 6,000 messages in just over a month, and over 10,000 total. You were clearly in an intimate relationship with Mr Nunes. There was no evidence it was a physical relationship. You could've reported matters, but you chose not to.'
Sentences handed down
Judge Carr concluded that imprisonment was 'the only appropriate sentence' in both defendants' cases. Nunes, of Newport, South Wales, was handed nine months in jail while Morris was jailed for 12 months.
Nunes was previously jailed for 12 years in 2019 for his involvement in an eight-man gang which was responsible for bringing in and distributing £2m of cocaine throughout Newport and the surrounding areas.
