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A coffee shop chain is to train inmates at Wormwood Scrubs prison as baristas in a bid to help more convicts find jobs after they are released.

Redemption Roasters claims to be the world’s only “behind-bars speciality coffee company”.

The company was started by Max Dubiel and Ted Rosner in 2017 and has branches in Bloomsbury, Farringdon and King’s Cross.

Every coffee bean sold in the start-up’s cafes was roasted by inmates at HM Prison Aylesbury — a young offender institution for those serving long sentences. Prisoners who work at the roastery are also given barista training and then helped into work after release.

Mr Rosner told the Standard they have been in talks with several UK prisons to provide barista training courses and plan to start teaching older prisoners in Wormwood Scrubs early this year.

“We’re really excited by these training courses,” he added. “We know from our work in Aylesbury that inmates will work harder than anyone else. They know that when they are released and are applying for jobs they will be up against people who don’t have records.”

Only a fifth of convicts find and keep a job for six months within a year of leaving jail, and almost half are reconvicted in that time, according to the Prison Reform Trust.

Redemption Roasters hopes its training plans will help remove the stigma around employing reformed convicts.

The company sells its coffee beans across the UK, including to wholesalers, small pub chains and the National Trust’s Waddesdon Manor.

Last year it crowdfunded more than £20,000 to launch a coffee-pod range.

The company has also been backed by prisons minister Rory Stewart. He said: “It’s initiatives like this that can make a real difference with the wider benefits felt by society.”