An inmate who targeted a female member of prison staff for unwanted sexual attention has received a further 20-month jail term for his actions over a few weeks last summer.
Amjad Aljarad, a previous sex offender in the UK and the Netherlands, was serving a sentence for sexual assault at HMP Durham in early summer last year.
Durham Crown Court heard that the first of his latest sequence of offences took place when inmates were being released from cells to collect medication on May 31.
Aljarad was said to have exposed his genitals to the prison staff member when he was being summoned from his cell.
But, when he was released to enable him to collect medication, rather than attend the medical area, he went to the showers, where he threw sachets of shampoo and bars of soap at officers attending.
Cainan Lonsdale, prosecuting, said Aljarad was ushered from the shower block to go to collect his medication, but, walking along the wing landing, he squeezed the left buttock of the same member of staff to whom he had earlier exposed himself.
She flinched and told him to get off her, and, when the defendant was placed back in his cell, she disclosed to a prison officer that Aljarad had sexually assaulted her.
Minutes later after ringing an attention bell, the victim of the earlier incident attended to see what the defendant wanted.
On looking through an observation hatch, Aljarad was seen performing a sex act.
Mr Lonsdale said she ignored him, and later began an adjudication process against the defendant, who was transferred to a different wing.
But in a further incident, when the defendant was next said to have seen the complainant, he winked at her and told her he would, “see her later”.
The defendant was then moved to the segregation unit but when the complainant was subsequently working there, Aljarad pressed the alarm signal 17 times in less than two hours, on one occasion exposing himself when she checked on him in his cell.
As she walked away, the defendant made loud comments of a sexual nature, which he repeated on a later occasion as she passed the shower block.
Mr Lonsdale said on another occasion the defendant approached the victim and said he was due to go to court over her allegations, which he said he would deny, to which she told him: “Amjad, you sexually assaulted me in the middle of the wing.”
He claimed he was, by then, only being detained because of the allegations she had made about him and urged her to drop the complaint she had made.
When Aljarad later saw her in the medical unit he smirked at her and subsequently had a message passed to her urging her, again, to drop her allegations.
Mr Lonsdale said the defendant’s actions made the victim feel intimidated and uneasy being in his vicinity
He said she spoke to the prison governor as she felt unable to cope, taking time off out of her annual leave, while also registering for counselling as she did not feel safe to return to work.
Mr Lonsdale added that in her impact statement she she said she felt constantly anxious and feared having to attend court for proceedings against Aljarad.
The 28-year-old defendant, however, said to be care/of HM Prison Service, admitted charges of sexual assault, three of exposure and one of witness intimidation, on his first court appearance.
His criminal record was said to include a sexual assault on a female, for which he was convicted at Liverpool Crown Court, in 2022, while he had four similar previous offences from the Netherlands.
He was said to have more recent convictions for assaulting an emergency worker.
Aljarad, who was unrepresented, told Judge James Adkin he had nothing to say in mitigation.
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The judge told him he had conducted, “a campaign of sexual offending” against the prison worker.
He said an aggravating feature was his “concerning sexual record”, in this country and abroad.
Imposing prison sentences totalling 20 months, the judge also made the defendant subject of sex offender notification requirements for ten years.
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