{"id":357384,"date":"2026-01-07T17:09:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T17:09:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/357384\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T17:09:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T17:09:09","slug":"prisoners-who-absconded-on-new-years-day-are-caught","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/357384\/","title":{"rendered":"Prisoners who absconded on New Year&#8217;s Day are caught"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Two inmates who absconded from an open prison on New Year&#8217;s Day have been arrested.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Matthew Armstrong, 35, and Daniel Washbourne, 40, both failed to return to HMP Leyhill in South Gloucestershire on 1 January.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Armstrong was arrested near Henley-in-Arden train station, Warwickshire, at 12:00 GMT. Washbourne was arrested in Bristol city centre at 13:30. Both were detained on suspicion of escaping lawful custody.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Armstrong was also arrested on suspicion of robbery, after an incident in a village near Leyhill the night before he absconded.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">A man had forced his way into a home on 31 December at about 18:45 GMT and threatened the occupants before stealing a mobile phone and a quantity of cash, Avon and Somerset Police said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Following the incident, officers interviewed the victims and neighbours, which led to Armstrong being arrested in relation to the offence.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">A third man accused of absconding from HMP Leyhill at the same time was arrested in Bristol on 3 January. <\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">He will next appear at Bristol Crown Court in February.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two inmates who absconded from an open prison on New Year&#8217;s Day have been arrested. Matthew Armstrong, 35,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350874,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-357384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357384\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}