By Satish Sekar © Satish Sekar (September 2^nd 2025)

The Gafoor Parole Outrage

Brutal sexually-motivated murderer, Jeffrey Gafoor was released earlier this year. Last October the Parole Board heard his sixth application for release behind closed doors. The Parole Board deliberately prevented this hearing being held in public – as usual it failed to live up to assurances it had given.

Gafoor’s rights were scrupulously upheld, but the victims’ relatives – all of them – saw their concerns brushed aside. This was an unusual case as a notorious miscarriage of justice had occurred before Gafoor was brought to justice. Incredibly, Gafoor received a lower tariff (the minimum that must be served before the applicant can be released from prison on parole) than two of the Cardiff Three who were wrongly imprisoned for his crime, the late Yusef Abdullahi and Tony Paris, received for his crime.

Gafoor was assisted through the parole process – it helped the guilty murderer and punished the Cardiff Five and their families for the crime of being innocent and having the temerity not to meekly accept so gross an injustice.[1]

Adding insult to injury the Parole Board irresponsibly published information on its website that all but identified me as a source demanding the hearing be held in public despite a hollow guarantee of anonymity. They also refused to rectify the error that they had made or even summarise my views accurately. This unaccountable QUANGO had no qualms about putting my safety at risk – this is not so much a dog-whistle to journalists who dare take them on as a fog-horn warning journalists not to challenge them. In my case, it won’t work.

Former Kenyan long distance runner Simon Biwott is now the Organizing Secretary of the Veteran Athletes Association. The VAA has soundly condemned gender violence and gender exploitation suffered by female athletes in Kenya (see Condemning GBV which was published at https://empowersmag.com/empowersmagwp/2025/09/28/condemning-gbv/ by us recently).

Biwott also condemned the Parole Board’s conduct in this case and warns about the consequences on whistleblowing journalism if such behaviour is tolerated.Simon Biwott on the Parole Board’s Conduct in the Lynette White Inquiry can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=US7RNssk8E4

[1] Next year my book exposing the tariff fiasco, Bad Form: How Tariffs Protect the Guilty and Punish the Innocent will be published.