Prince William Accused of Profiting Off Prison Where Inmates Were Exposed to Toxic Gas: ‘Abominable’

King Charles and future king Prince William are facing explosive questions over a prison owned by their billion-dollar royal estate which allegedly remained open despite years of warnings about deadly radioactive radon gas, critics tell the National Enquirer.

HMP Dartmoor, in Devon, England, is owned by the Duchy of Cornwall — the vast royal estate controlled first by Charles and now by William — and leased to Britain’s HM Prison and Probation Service. Before the prison closed in July 2024, guards, nurses and inmates were allegedly exposed to dangerous levels of radon gas. Some former workers have since developed cancer, and two have died, attorney Inaam Barkatoolah, who is representing them in a lawsuit, has revealed to the National Enquirer.

Despite scientific evidence from 2020 showing radon levels at the prison were 10 to 14 times higher than the recommended action level, Barkatoolah claims, the Duchy of Cornwall signed a new 10-year lease with HM Prison and Probation Service in March 2022 reportedly worth about $2 million a year, per The Independent.

At the time, the Duchy was controlled by then-Prince Charles, 77. When Queen Elizabeth II died and Charles became king in September 2022, William, 44, inherited the estate, assuming control of the Duchy’s vast property holdings — including HMP Dartmoor, per the New York Post.

The prison, about 200 miles west of Buckingham Palace, remained open for another 28 months until mounting criticism and legal action from law firm Kesar & Co. helped prompt the Ministry of Justice to close the facility in July 2024, per the BBC. Dozens of staff and 175 inmates were evacuated, according to Sky News.

Two former prison workers represented by Kesar have since died — one from lung cancer, another from bowel cancer — while a third is currently hospitalized in critical condition, according to Barkatoolah.

The firm represents roughly 800 current and former prison staff and inmates who are suing the Ministry of Justice and HM Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS). The Ministry of Justice and HMPPS say they monitored radon levels, restricted access to affected areas, improved ventilation and relocated prisoners as a precaution, according to the BBC.

“To learn that the prison remained open after the 2022 lease was signed is abominable,” says Barkatoolah.

“In this situation, profit and finances were put above the people,” the solicitor tells the Enquirer. “The [new] lease was signed because it was a good value, and they [the Duchy and the government] didn’t take precautions and test properly when they were supposed to, despite knowledge of the high levels of radon.” Per the CDC, the colorless, odorless radioactive gas is released naturally from granite and other rocks and soil.

“God knows how many people have passed from lung cancer — and they didn’t know they were ever exposed to radon because nobody was told!” Barkatoolah alleges.

Sarah Rigby, assistant general secretary for the Prison Officers’ Association, tells the Enquirer, “It is almost impossible to say at this point what impact the excessive radon levels have had — or will have — on the staff who worked there.” She adds that she’s “unsure how much responsibility the Duchy have for the site, to be honest.”

Elevated radon levels were detected at the prison in 2007, per the BBC, but critics say officials responded largely by recommending increased ventilation and opening windows in the granite prison, which dates to the Napoleonic Wars.

One former HMP Dartmoor guard told the BBC that being a prison guard “has always been renowned as being the worst job for retirement, because you don’t have much of a retirement,” adding that “so many staff” are now battling cancer.

When the prison closed in 2024, there were still eight years left on the lease. William agreed to forgo the remaining payments owed to the Duchy, and the money instead has been redirected to nearby communities that have been battling radon since it was detected in 1987, per DevonLive.

The future king’s decision came after the Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC), which monitors public spending, slammed the March 2022 lease agreement, calling it a “needless waste of taxpayers’ money,” per The Telegraph.

According to DevonLive, Ian Patrick, the prince’s private secretary, said, “The duke felt strongly that … the benefit of this income should remain in the community, helping local people shape that future.”

But the scandal isn’t going away. “From top to bottom,” PAC chairman Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown said, per the U.K. Parliament’s official site, “the issue of HMP Dartmoor is an absolute disgrace.”