Janice Burns claims her son Jordan was not given mental health support or medication despite numerous suicide attempts.
News Karin Goodwin 04:30, 23 Mar 2025Updated 16:35, 26 Mar 2025
A grieving mum is to sue the prison where her 22-year-old son was left to die alone in his cell after multiple suicide attempts.
Jordan Burns tried to take his own life with a razor blade, set fire to his cell and had to be resuscitated twice from drug overdoses during ten months as an unconvicted remand prisoner at HMP Addiewell in West Lothian.
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Mum Janice Burns has claimed he was omitted from a suicide prevention programme while being denied mental health support and medication for post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Jordan was found dead in his cell on November 10, 2023, having suffered an overdose.
An investigation by the Ferret has revealed Janice and her lawyer Aamer Anwar are now preparing to sue the private jail while politicians have demanded an immediate investigation into the shocking case.
She has accused the justice system of “serving a death sentence” on her son who had been facing an assault charge.
She said: “His cries for help were ignored. They took my boy’s life before it had even started.
“He was sent to Addiewell on remand, was there for almost a year, and when he came home to me it was in a coffin.
“This has happened to too many people. I just want to help change things so no other young boy or family has to go through this.
“My son didn’t deserve to die. His death was preventable.”
Janice, who asked not to be identified in the picture we took to protect her younger children, admits her son was no angel and had troubled teenage years which led to a criminal record.
But she wanted to share the pictures of Jordan that fill her home – a beaming little boy in his over-sized, first school uniform, a more pensive young man hugging the family dog.
In one of his mother’s favourites his arm is around his youngest brother, who is still just six.
Results from the post mortem concluded he died of a drug overdose but it cannot answer Janice’s question about her son’s intentions that night.
With the support of human rights lawyer Anwar she is now planning to take legal action against the prison.
Jordan had previously been on the prison “Talk to Me” suicide prevention strategy but Janice has said he was taken off the programme.
In one harrowing incident just weeks before his death he took a razor blade to his own throat and called his then-solicitor, threatening to kill himself.
He also told the lawyer he had been waiting for mental health support for months.
Investigative journalism website The Ferret has uncovered documents released under Freedom of Information show that on the night Jordan died three of the prison wings were in lockdown and more than one in ten of the 109 “operational staff” were off sick. Staff shortages are a longstanding issue in the prison.
Janice added: “He was loving and funny and smart and loved by his family and friends. I feel like someone has ripped my heart out. “Someone there could have helped him. But nobody did. Instead he was punished.”
Addiewell is Scotland’s only private prison. It is run and partly owned and run by private company Sodexo, while an additional 67 per cent is owned by Infrastructure Investment Holdings - an arm of London investment firm, HICL Infrastructure.
At a meeting with Addiewell governor Samantha Pariser four months after Jordan’s death, Janice claims she was not allowed to have her advocate from charity Families Outside in the room though a prison officer she had never met was present.
She says she would not have felt legal action was necessary if Addiewell had apologised for Jordan’s death, been accountable and promised change.
Lawyer Aamer Anwar, who also represented the families of several other young people who died in custody, has said Jordan was “severely mistreated” while in prison.
He added: “There was no care plan for a desperate young man following multiple suicide attempts.
“The prison effectively sanctioned a death sentence and for that they should face prosecution.
“Instead of getting justice, families like Jordan’s face the possibility of years of gaslighting, lies, and cover ups before a fatal accident inquiry that cannot even assign blame or determine guilt.”
Scottish Labour Justice spokesperson Pauline McNeill said: “Jordan’s family deserve answers about his death and it is not right that they have had to fight so hard for the truth. The SNP government must urgently investigate what went on here.”
Fulton MacGregor, SNP MSP for Coatbridge and Chryston, where the family lives, added: “This family deserves answers and I am willing to do all that I can to support them.”
Dr Tracey Gillies, medical director, for NHS Lothian said it was “committed to ensuring all prisoners have access to timely mental health services”. Prisoners also have access to support through in-cell phones, she added and she claimed prescribed medication is checked on arrival in prison.
An HMP Addiewell spokesperson said its thoughts were with the Burns family and said it understood “how difficult this time continues to be”. The prison said it could not comment further while waiting for a fatal accident inquiry into Jordan’s death.
The Scottish Prison service claimed 53 percent of the 64 deaths in Scottish jails last year were due to “natural causes”.
A spokesperson insisted prisoners have unrestricted access to the Samaritans service via in-cell telephones and families can now phone the prison to raise mental health concerns.
Sodexo said their thoughts were with the family. Lothian and Borders NHS, which provides healthcare in the prison, claimed that it was “committed to ensuring all prisoners have access to timely mental health services”.
They said that Jordan’s death will be subject to a fatal accident inquiry.
Last year there were a record 64 deaths in Scottish prisons.
Jordan was one of 40 people who died in jail in 2023.
Addiewell has been subject to intense criticism in recent years.
A damning report published in May 2023 found less than one third of inmates said they felt safe and one in four claimed to have been assaulted, or abused by staff.
In 2023/24, the prison had to pay £2.7million to the Scottish Prison Service for failing to meet agreed performance indicators in the last financial year. In the same year it paid out more than £1.5m of dividends to its shareholders.
Since Jordan died, there have been 14 more deaths in Addiewell.
*If you have been impacted by the issues raised in this story you can contact the Samaritans on 116 123 or if you have a family member in prison you can contact Families Outside on 0800 254 0088
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