A disgraced prison nurse has revealed for the first time how she was swept into Britain’s biggest ever jail smuggling racket – after falling hopelessly in love with a manipulative convicted criminal.

Amy Hatfield, 40, used her trusted role as a mental health support worker to flood HMP Lindholme with £1million worth of contraband after becoming ‘infatuated’ with career criminal Joseph Whittingham.

Their forbidden romance spiralled into the ‘largest and most complex’ prison smuggling network ever uncovered by police – with phones, USB sticks, money and a cocktail of illicit drugs trafficked inside.

Hatfield, a mother-of-two, was jailed for more than a decade in 2023 for her pivotal role.

Now released, the shamed former nurse has now lifted the lid on how she fell under Whittingham’s spell – admitting the inmate who lured her in ‘will always have a place in my heart’.

Hatfield told BBC podcast Gangster Presents: Sex, Drugs & Cell Block Parties: ‘He’ll always have a place in my heart, but it just wasn’t meant to be, me and him.’

Hatfield, a single mother, embarked on an affair with Whittingham after he began flirting with her at the Category C prison near Doncaster, South Yorks, in 2018.

She became obsessed with the ‘heavily convicted’ inmate, and soon the pair were engaged in a sexual relationship he then exploited to pull her into his smuggling empire.

Hatfield described how Whittingham would call her from a phone smuggled behind bars, whispering fantasies down the line and telling her how he ‘can’t wait to get me in bed’.

Their nightly conversations became part of a carefully concealed double life she hid from her family and friends in Barnsley, South Yorkshire.

Hatfield said: ‘When I got home from work, I used to put the other phone on. And then he’d ring me at a certain time because officers were doing checks.

‘So, as soon as the phone rang, I ran up into my bedroom out of way of the kids, so they didn’t hear who I was speaking to.

‘We would just chat away on the night, talking about going away together, weekends away, just spending time with families.’

Hatfield insisted she initially felt no attraction to the inmate, whom she described as ‘short’ and not her ‘usual type’, but at a time when her ‘confidence was at rock bottom’, his attention overwhelmed her.

She said: ‘I’ve been used to being put down in past relationships, and he was giving me compliments.

‘Just saying I was beautiful. He used to call me ‘lips’ because he said I had nice lips.’

Hatfield told how she initially tried to rebuff Whittingham’s advances during mental health sessions inside the prison but eventually succumbed.

She said: ‘He said ‘Do you think we could make a go of it?’ I told him no straight away because it’s obviously my job. And then he just asked me to think about it.

‘I think he just liked the thrill of it. That’s all he was interested in.’

Once seduced, she became a vital cog in his prison drug network – even arranging fake mental health sessions so she could hand over smuggled packages to inmates.

She says she acted out of fear for Whittingham, who claimed he had amassed huge drug debts inside.

Hatfield said: ‘He made a few hints saying we could make some money before he gets out, for his future.

‘And then he told me he was in debt. And if he didn’t pay, then they would harm his family.’

The racket came crashing down in October 2019 when anti-corruption officers intercepted Hatfield at the prison gate on her fifth smuggling run.

She was carrying a staggering haul of contraband – including two litres of liquid spice disguised in Ribena bottles – worth around £1 million behind bars. The trove also included vials of cannabis, MDMA, ketamine, anabolic steroids and testosterone.

Recalling the moment she realised the game was up, she said: ‘I drove the longer way around so I could see directly if there were any vans in the courtyard because if there were vans in the courtyard, you were getting searched.

‘There were none there. I sat in the car for about five minutes contemplating whether to go in. I walked in, got through the first gate.

‘And then as I came out of the second gate, there was a security officer stood there. I looked at him and I knew. When he just said my name, I thought, “That’s it, I’m done”.

‘I just wanted the ground to swallow me up. What have I been doing? A bit of reality kind of hit me. But then I was glad it was over.’

Police quickly uncovered her connection to Whittingham, even finding his number saved as ‘HMP Joe’, a hotel booking for his planned release day and an email confirming underwear she had purchased for their first date on the outside.

Seventeen people were ultimately convicted over the operation.

Whittingham, who had a ‘leading role’, even recruited his own wife and father to launder payments.

Judge Kirstie Watson told the court he had ‘exploited’ Hatfield’s feelings as the pair engaged in ‘sexual activity within the prison and the exchanging of images’.

While on remand awaiting sentencing for misconduct in a public office, Hatfield confessed to still being in love with Whittingham, who was sentenced to 11 years and four months in prison.

She said: ‘As time passed on, I did think about him now and again.

‘I saw him in the holding cells and he told me he was in another relationship. It did hurt because we always said even if we got stopped, we would wait.’

Released from prison in early 2025 after serving half her term, Hatfield tried to rebuild her life. Whittingham was also freed but was recalled within three weeks for contacting her.

‘He was just bombarding me with phone calls, text messages,’ she said. ‘And I just kept blanking it, ignored it.

‘My probation worker…went “If you don’t report this then it’s going to look bad on you and you could end up being recalled”.’

Whittingham was sent to HMP Woodhill, near Milton Keynes, where he was found dead in his cell earlier this year at the age of 36. The cause is under investigation.

Hatfield said she was ‘heartbroken’ over his death, adding: ‘I feel a lot of guilt and blame that it’s my fault.

‘Because he obviously made contact with me. I feel like if it hadn’t been for that, he would still be here, he’d still be alive.’

She added: ‘I just think it’s such a shame because he had a lot of potential.’

The scandal unfolded during a period in which seven inmates died after taking Spice inside HMP Lindholme. Toxicology tests linked the batch that killed 37-year-old inmate Kyle Batsford directly to drugs seized from Hatfield’s bags.

Drug use surged after she began working there in 2018 and dropped sharply after her arrest, the court heard.

Hatfield told how she is now helping prisoners readjust to society upon their release and has settled down with a new partner.

She added: ‘At the time I didn’t see the consequences of what I was doing.

‘I was just blindsided by everything. I just wish I never took it in. It’s something I’ve got to live with – regret and shame.’

She continued: ‘I just can’t understand myself to this day why I got myself involved in all this.’