Sarah Reed

Sarah Lynne Reed (22 June 1984 – 11 January 2016) was a British prisoner waiting for psychiatric reports before a possible trial. A woman with a history of mental health problems, and a victim of police brutality a few years earlier, Reed died while on remand in Holloway prison. It was later found that the denial of medical treatment had led to her death, and that she would not have been able to plead.

Personal history A mixed-race black woman, Reed's mental health problems began in 2003 after the sudden death of her baby daughter. Along with the baby's father, she was given the wrapped remains to take to the undertakers in a taxi. In 2012, Reed was the victim of a severe attack from a white police officer PC James Kiddie, and suffered two broken ribs. She was later convicted for the shoplifting offence. He was dismissed from the Metropolitan Police. The officer had two previous confirmed complaints lodged against him, the second for discriminatory comments made in 2011.

While in the psychiatric Maudsley Hospital in 2014, Reed told her family that she was sexually assaulted by an elderly male patient;

On 11 January 2016, in Holloway prison's medical wing, Reed was found to be unresponsive on her prison bed with strips of linen around her neck. The Ministry of Justice said that CPR was attempted, but she was pronounced dead shortly after she was found.

Inquest and related issues The inquest verdict was that Reed had killed herself by self-strangulation. Reed was the last woman to die in Holloway prison; reports of the racist treatment of prisoners dated back to the 1980s.