Mr Raymond Alieu Kamara v The Secretary of State for Justice and 1 other — 2026

The tribunal dismissed Mr Raymond Alieu Kamara's claims of direct race discrimination, race-related harassment and unauthorised deductions from wages in the joined proceedings against the Secretary of State for Justice and Nicola Hollihead. Kamara remained employed at HMP Wandsworth at the hearing. The tribunal treated the alleged events as a continuing course of conduct and found the claims in time. It refused his application to add further heads of claim on the first hearing day.

The tribunal found that Kamara arrived late on 1 January 2024 because he had overslept, following an earlier verbal warning. Although he had not unlocked prisoners during the security incident on 31 January, he had failed to alert the officers designated Oscar 1 or Oscar 2, so guidance about reporting security risks was warranted. Hollihead subsequently attributed an incorrect prisoner count to him because she had received incorrect information. She corrected that error and apologised. The tribunal rejected the allegation that these events formed a discriminatory campaign.

Any check on Kamara's posting would have served the operational need to track staff deployment; the tribunal rejected his allegation that Hollihead deliberately followed him around the prison. Mr Rullay, rather than Hollihead, refused his transfer request. Although Rullay misstated how long Kamara had worked on the wing, the tribunal found an operational basis for the refusal because his service there was still short and he remained on probation. The proposed comparators did not establish less favourable treatment in materially comparable circumstances.

The assault on Kamara on 8 February 2024 was dealt with through internal adjudication, with the prisoner found guilty and cautioned. The tribunal found that it caused no life-threatening injury and was not an Annex A offence under the joint Ministry of Justice and HMPPS police-referral policy. The decision not to refer it to the Metropolitan Police therefore complied with that policy and was not influenced by race. The tribunal also found no established need to separate Kamara from the prisoner before May and no proven safety risk from the prisoner's later servery work during the period complained of.

The initial sickness classification reflected the information Kamara had given his managers. Sick leave excusal required him to submit an application, and the tribunal found that managers provided the form, guidance and support in April 2024. It attributed most subsequent application delays to his late submissions, errors and missing documents. The judgment recorded the grievance finding that some welfare support had not been as robust or timely as expected, but found no deliberate misclassification. Delay in concluding the grievance arose from operational pressures, not race, although Laura Yardy should have explained the later delay to Kamara.