It lasts just four and a half minutes. But the video of Linda De Sousa Abreu having sex with an inmate encapsulates everything wrong inside Britain’s jails.
Intimacy between staff and prisoners is illegal, something even the greenest prison officers know. For the 30-year-old to have taken part in a filmed sex session with a serial criminal in his cell at Wandsworth Prison last month was only going to end one way — out of a job and facing jail time.
Yesterday, De Sousa Abreu pleaded guilty at Isleworth Crown Court to one count of misconduct in public office. She will be sentenced in November.
Such relationships are banned for good reason. During the romp behind a closed cell door, her uniform trousers were around her ankles, with the man’s hands at one point around her neck. She could hardly have been more vulnerable.
Seasoned lags also know that such relationships open the door for long-term manipulation, giving them leverage to persuade or blackmail staff to smuggle in drugs, weapons and phones — all items that compromise prison security.
Linda De Sousa Abreu pleaded guilty at Isleworth Crown Court yesterday to one count of misconduct in public office. She will be sentenced in November
Prison inmate Linton Weirich was arrested for breaking into a woman’s home and stealing tools – the police were able to identify him as a suspect because he had been wearing an ankle tag
The married mother-of-one’s intimate liaison was filmed and then shared on a phone operated by the cellmate of Linton Weirich, the prolific burglar who had sex with De Sousa Abreu.
During the filming, the cameraman openly smoked what appears to be a ‘joint’ while delivering a commentary that raises serious questions as to who is actually running the south London jail. ‘This is how we live at Wandsworth, bruv, yeah,’ the bearded inmate gloatingly announces as he holds the suspicious cigarette in full view of his camera.
When De Sousa Abreu’s prison radio, carelessly discarded on a table, crackles into life he angrily shouts towards it: ‘Shut the f*** up… f*** off.’ He also tells Weirich not to worry about being disturbed by other prison staff. ‘No one’s coming through my door, bro,’ he says. ‘I will fight him — do your ting bro.’
There are many questions surrounding this sordid case, but the first must surely be this: how on earth could De Sousa Abreu have been considered suitable material to become a prison officer?
A self-confessed swinger, last year, she and her husband Nathan appeared on a Channel 4 show in which participants took part in threesomes and orgies. ‘Monogamy is a social construct that I think needs to be dismantled,’ she opined to camera. ‘Opening up our relationship has allowed us to form a deeper connection with each other.’
Other videos of the couple that have since surfaced online all too graphically illustrate that point.
As did De Sousa Abreu’s OnlyFans account, in which the public could pay to see ‘hot content’ of this ‘happily married sexy Latina’. Over on Facebook, there she is again, pouting and posing and making crude gestures to the camera as she listens to rap songs about ‘hood n****** and drug dealers and gang members with tattoos’. Below one photo a caption reads: ‘What’s your type? Bandits, outlaws and criminals.’
No surprise, then, that an investigation is under way to determine how De Sousa Abreu passed the vetting process. The concern is that staff shortages are now so severe, anyone can get a job.
Her sister has revealed that she warned her not to ‘mix her lifestyle with her work’ — advice she spectacularly ignored.
Meanwhile friends have told the Mail that her husband of six years was left ‘shocked’ by what happened and its fallout.
‘We are all human and we all do make mistakes and sometimes impulse can get the better of us,’ one said. ‘But it is probably one of the poorest decisions she has made.’
HMP Wandsworth in South London where De Sousa Abreu worked as a prison officer
Her father-in-law goes further still, telling the Mail: ‘This is something that happened where she was on her own. She was the person in charge and she was the one who needs to take responsibility as far as I’m concerned.
‘He [her husband] didn’t know she was doing anything… She’s an idiot as far as I’m concerned.’
As for the current state of the couple’s marriage, he declined to comment — other than describing it as ‘political’.
Weirich’s personal relationships have also suffered. His heavily pregnant girlfriend was so upset by the video she required hospital treatment.
But his family loyally insists that while he deeply regrets what happened, the fault lies with De Sousa Abreu. ‘If they’re offering it on a plate, then the guy’s gonna take it, you know what I mean?’ his mother Sheila told this newspaper.
Might there, even, be other inmates with whom she has similarly interacted? A Ministry of Justice spokesperson declined to comment.
Online, speculation has been rife that the video was a ‘stunt’ to boost De Sousa Abreu’s profile and increase her earning potential for her other activities.
But judging from her one public pronouncement since the incident, that does not appear to be the case. Not yet, at least.
‘I have not monetised one f****** bit at all,’ she claimed in a video message posted on her social media account two weeks ago. Indeed, what seemed to most annoy her was the fact that others had done so — posting porn videos featuring fake female prison guards to cash in on the viral video’s fame.
‘Very, very distasteful for you to monetise or advertise yourselves as me for OnlyFans content,’ she moaned. ‘It is very distasteful.’
Most striking of all is the lack of remorse. Because the reality is that her actions have not just cost her her job and any reputation she might have had — but put the lives of other decent prison officers at serious risk.
‘Prisons are predatory places,’ Professor Ian Acheson, former prison governor and senior advisor to the Counter Extremism Project, told the Daily Mail.
‘This alleged incident together with hardcore porn re-enactments will have been seen by thousands of prisoners thousands of times.
‘The commodification of female officers as ‘meat’ will put them at active risk.’
And he added: ‘I am particularly worried about female officers working in the high security estate who are in close daily proximity to extremely dangerous people with no impulse control such as serial rapists and terrorists.
‘This case is a public relations disaster for HM Prison and Probation Service. But more importantly it undermines the safety and security of front-line female staff who do such a vital job on our behalf.’
The married officer was filmed having sex in a cell with inmate Weirich, 36, which was posted on social media
Former Wandsworth prison officer De Sousa Abreu posts ‘hot content’ on OnlyFans for subscribers
In recent years, incidents involving female staff caught having sex with male inmates have dramatically increased. In the three years to March 2023, 31 were sacked, including one who gave birth to her inmate lover’s baby and another who had his cell number tattooed on her thigh.
This is a rise of over 50 per cent from the 19 women sacked in the previous four-year period, excluding private prison incidents.
Former prison officers suggest the actual numbers are higher, as staff often resign before incidents become public. The growing problem is partly due to changes in prison staffing.
Since women began working in male prisons in the 1980s, their numbers have steadily grown, with 40 per cent of public sector prison staff now female. The minimum entry age has dropped from 21 to 18, and extreme staff shortages mean new recruits quickly find themselves on the front line.
Prison Service sources have told the Mail that an internal review of De Sousa Abreu’s selection process is now under way. All applications are screened by a private company called SSCL (Shared Services Connected Limited) which has a wide range of public sector contracts, including with the Ministry of Defence and Metropolitan Police.
Any concerns that come to light are then dealt with by the Prison Service’s in-house personnel security vetting team. Checks are undertaken to an ‘appropriate level for each role’ and can include criminal record and employment history as well as digital, social media and financial checks. Recruits are required to provide information on themselves, their family, co-residents and any associations that may cause a conflict of interest with their job.
Which brings us back to the Wandsworth scandal. De Sousa Abreu became a prison officer at the start of this year and only ever worked at Wandsworth.
A Portuguese national, it is understood her father comes from Venezuela and her mother from Madeira, an autonomous Portuguese territory off the coast of Africa. According to her older sister, Andreina, the family moved to the UK in 1996, settling in London. There, in her early 20s, Abreu met her future husband. The following year the couple had a daughter and in 2018 married at a ceremony in a Roman Catholic church attended by their extended families.
De Sousa Abreu worked as a personal trainer and practised martial arts, as did her husband, but in the autumn of 2022 they successfully applied to take part in the second series of a Channel 4 show called Open House: The Great Sex Experiment, in which couples were filmed ‘pushing the boundaries’ of their relationships at a luxury country escape.
Weirich, a prolific burglar and Love Island wannabe, was sentenced to four years in prison
Weirich’s girlfriend is seven months pregnant – her health has suffered since the prison footage was posted on social media, and she was recently hospitalised
A friend said: ‘I think they had seen the first series and thought it would be fun. It was just about a new experience.’
‘You can see them in a room with a lot of people and an orgy happens,’ the friend said about the show, broadcast last year.
At around the same time De Sousa Abreu began sharing increasingly explicit videos on social media.
‘I am a happily married sexy Latina who wants to share hot content with you,’ the bio of her OnlyFans account read.
‘Experience my real life, real love, real sex and real orgasms!’
Why she then became a prison officer is unclear. But sister Andreina, herself a personal trainer and nutritionist, said she was immediately concerned when she learned of her career choice.
‘I only found out she worked for the Prison Service in January,’ she said. ‘That’s when I spoke to her and said do not mix your lifestyle with work. Don’t be stupid.’
She added: ‘I’ve had my say with her, I was very brutally honest with her about her behaviours. I spoke to her previously about her lifestyle. As her older sister, the only blame I have is that I should have been more thorough, I should have been harsher.’
But who could have predicted that, just months into her new job, she would have followed the path she did? Footage of the sex session found its way on to social media within hours of being filmed on June 27.
After the video went viral, De Sousa Abreu was identified by HMP Wandsworth staff and arrested on June 28 at Heathrow. She had telephoned the prison as she fled to the airport to say she was not returning to work and that her husband would return her equipment.
Weirich, 36, was also quickly identified. He is serving more than four years in prison after being convicted at Kingston Crown Court of multiple counts of burglary, including stealing £65,000 of goods in a raid on a luxury Kensington flat.
Still wearing her wedding ring, Abreu was spotted shopping with her mother in Hammersmith, west London, earlier this month
Three break-ins were carried out minutes from the flat in Richmond, where he lived with his girlfriend.
Weirich had broken into one woman’s home while she was having building work done but only managed to steal a few drills before being arrested.
Footage published by Weirich on social media suggests that, like De Sousa Abreu, he is no shrinking violet.
His mother told the Mail that he had previously harboured hopes of playing football for Arsenal and appearing on ITV dating show Love Island. A video shared by Weirich on TikTok shows him leaving prison having served a previous sentence for dangerous driving in October last year. He captioned the post: ‘Freedom is priceless’.
His TikTok contains a number of bare-chested workout videos. Other pictures show him posing in designer clothes, posted to his Instagram account, where he describes himself as an ‘online coach, personal trainer and musician’.
To that list he should probably add ‘love cheat’.
Weirich’s partner is expecting their baby in September. ‘This is the last thing she needs in her condition, it’s extremely upsetting,’ a source close to the woman said when the footage of him and De Sousa Abreu emerged.
Last week, Weirich’s mother said that since the incident the girlfriend had not been to visit her son in prison, adding: ‘She’s very upset. She doesn’t really talk about it, she tries to block it off really.’
Weirich’s older sister added: ‘He does regret doing what he did. She’s a good woman, his girlfriend. A decent girl.’
Both refused to lay the blame on Weirich, saying ‘corrupt’ officers are responsible for smuggling in phones and other items in to jail. His sister said she agreed with suggestions De Sousa Abreu had ‘done it for her OnlyFans, that’s what a lot of people are saying, because even on the video she’s happy and smiling’.
The Mail understands that neither Weirich or the man who filmed the sex session has been investigated by police and Weirich’s mother confirmed that her son had subsequently been put in segregation and moved to a different prison.
What the future holds for De Sousa Abreu only time will tell.
‘This was a shocking breach of the public’s trust,’ said Tetteh Turkson, of the Crown Prosecution Service, following yesterday’s hearing. ‘De Sousa Abreu was clearly an enthusiastic participant who wrongly thought she would avoid responsibility.
‘The CPS recognises there is no excuse for any prison officer who conducts themselves in such a manner, and we will never hesitate to prosecute those who abuse their position of power.
‘After working closely with the Metropolitan Police to build the strongest possible case, De Sousa Abreu had no option but accept she was guilty.
‘She will now rightly face the consequences of her actions.’
But the worry must be that other, hardworking, women prison officers will suffer as a result of her incredibly foolish actions as well.
