Mother of Henry Nowak’s Killer to Be Freed Under Early-Release Scheme

The mother of Henry Nowak’s killer is set to leave prison after serving only a third of her sentence, under Labour’s early-release scheme. She was jailed for removing the murder weapon from the scene.

Kiran Kaur, 53, is expected to be released in December through the controversial programme, which aims to free as many as 50,000 offenders each year.

Kaur is among the highest-profile offenders to benefit from Labour’s early-release policy so far.

She was sentenced to three years in prison on July 17 after being found guilty of assisting an offender.

Kaur is believed to have spent around seven months in custody on remand before sentencing. As a result, she will qualify for release in December after serving one-third of her sentence.

Her son, Vickrum Digwa, stabbed 18-year-old Henry Nowak to death in Southampton on December 3 last year using an eight-inch ceremonial dagger.

Digwa was convicted of murder in June and sentenced to life imprisonment, with a minimum term of 21 years.

Digwa, who is Sikh, did not know the teenager. At the scene, however, he told police that Mr Nowak had shouted racist abuse, punched him and knocked off his turban.

Mr Nowak was arrested while lying in his own blood and later died alone in police custody.

After Digwa and his mother were sentenced, the Crown Prosecution Service released footage showing the moment the killer instructed Kaur to take away the knife used in the attack.

In the footage, recorded on Digwa’s phone and pointed towards the ground, he can be heard speaking to his mother in Punjabi and asking her to remove the weapon.

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A transcript published by the CPS shows Digwa telling Kaur: “Take this.” Prosecutors said he was referring to the knife.

During Kaur’s sentencing at Southampton Crown Court, Judge William Mousley said that by the time Digwa asked her to remove the weapon, “you knew or believed that he had stabbed and injured Henry”.

The judge also told Kaur that “a responsible parent would have challenged their son over their actions and encouraged them to do the right thing”.

Judge Mousley said Kaur took the murder weapon home and placed it alongside a “larger collection of ceremonial and other weapons” in her son’s bedroom.

He said this helped conceal the knife’s use because Kaur wanted her son to “avoid being caught”.

The judge said her actions ‘added to your son’s pretence that he had done nothing wrong and that he was the victim’, and added that she added to the ‘degradation of Henry being arrested when he was dying’.

Prosecuting barrister Nicholas Lobbenberg told the court that the weapon was not found by police until December 10 last year – seven days after the attack.

It remains unclear whether Kaur, an Indian national, will face deportation proceedings, according to ITV News, which first reported Kaur’s impending release.

A Home Office spokesman said: ‘Our thoughts remain with the family and friends of Henry Nowak, whose life was cruelly cut short in a horrific act of violence.

‘We will always seek to deport foreign criminals at the first opportunity.’

Labour’s prison release scheme launched at the start of this month.

From November 10 it will be extended to offenders serving sentences up to three years and three months, meaning Kaur will become eligible.

Labour’s new programme is broader in scope than its previous release scheme, launched in 2024, which saw 70,000 criminals let out early in its first 19 months.

Despite being scheduled for early release, Kaur will appeal against her sentence at the Court of Appeal on November 5.

On the same day the court is due to consider an appeal by Digwa against his sentence, and also decide on a referral from the Attorney General which argued the sentence was too lenient. Digwa is also mounting a separate appeal against his conviction.