Brother's anger over Katie Allan's death at young offenders unit


Katie Allan, a young woman who was 21 years old when she ended her life while incarcerated in Polmont Young Offenders Institution, was destroyed by a justice system meant to keep her safe, according to her brother Scott Allan. Katie was three months into a 16-month prison sentence for drink driving when she was found in her cell in June 2018. Her case is part of a fatal accident inquiry looking into three deaths in custody at Polmont.
The FAI into Katie’s death, which heard that she was vulnerable and had a history of self-harm that Polmont prison staff were not aware of, will have its determination published on 29 October, alongside that of 16-year-old William Brown. The results of the inquiry into 20-year-old Jack McKenzie’s suicide in 2021 will be released at a later date.
Katie was “tortured” and “destroyed” by the prison environment, claimed her brother, who said the authorities had “abandoned” her. Her allocated prison officer stated in the FAI that she was “not built for prison”. She struggled, became more vulnerable and was taunted by other prisoners before her death. Her mother Linda gave evidence that Katie had been left traumatised by the abuse. “She made a mistake and she paid for it with her life,” Scott said.
Scott was 15 years old when Katie died. Even then, he could see the flaws in the prison system which led his sister to become “too scared to keep living”. “They blatantly murdered her,” he told BBC Scotland News. “The lack of empathy. And it was more and more evident, not just from my sister, but the stories she told me about other prisoners when in Polmont. They’re absolutely abandoned to get on with it.”
Scott’s life was thrown into turmoil by Katie’s death, and he admits that he struggled to come to terms with it for years. “I was angry the whole time. I was a child, and I could see the flaws of the prison system,” he said, recounting how he had watched “someone I treasure lose themselves slowly

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