{"id":672291,"date":"2026-07-03T20:55:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T20:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/672291\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T20:55:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T20:55:08","slug":"hmp-rochester-prison-guard-spared-jail-over-inmate-relationship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/672291\/","title":{"rendered":"HMP Rochester prison guard spared jail over inmate relationship"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The court heard how Casaletto, 32, used three different phones while inside the prison, which he switched around one after another.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In messages to the defendant&#8217;s mother, she also said: &#8220;Obviously doesn&#8217;t look great me saying he&#8217;s in prison and not only does that look bad I also work there&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">She also wrote: &#8220;Wish I never worked where I did and all of this wouldn&#8217;t have been an issue.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Handwritten letters were found at Smith&#8217;s home address, including some from the prisoner, and some written by her, in which she described him as the &#8220;love of my life&#8221; and said: &#8220;Cannot wait to see what our future holds together.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Smith received a 24-month suspended sentence, while Casaletto was given an eight month suspended sentence for unauthorised transmission of an image or sound by electric communication from within a prison.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Both Casaletto an Smith had pleaded guilty to the offences at earlier hearings.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Smith, of The Street, Pluckley, Ashford in Kent, was emotional in the dock throughout the sentencing hearing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">On deciding not to hand down immediate jail terms, Judge Harris said he had taken the &#8220;exceptional course for slightly different reasons for both of you&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Of Smith, he said: &#8220;You have no previous offending, I am confident on the report I&#8217;ve seen you won&#8217;t offend again.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;There is very strong personal mitigation for you.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Follow BBC Surrey on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BBCSurrey\/\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook, external<\/a>, on <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BBCSurrey\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">X, external<\/a>, and on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/bbcinsurrey\/\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Instagram, external<\/a> and listen to BBC Radio Surrey <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sounds\/play\/live\/bbc_radio_surrey\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">on Sounds<\/a>. Send your story ideas to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/mailto:southeasttoday@bbc.co.uk\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">southeasttoday@bbc.co.uk, external<\/a> or WhatsApp us on 08081 002250.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The court heard how Casaletto, 32, used three different phones while inside the prison, which he switched around&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":672292,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-672291","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\/672291","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=672291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672291\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/672292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=672291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=672291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=672291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}