A PRISON officer is facing jail for having a relationship with an inmate who is serving a 10 year sentence for battering his girlfriend.

A judge warned Alisha Fallows, of Barrow, she could be sent to prison after she admitted having a romantic relationship with Damien Baxendale while she worked at HMP Lancaster Farms.

It has now been revealed Baxendale is serving a decade in prison after he punched and kicked his defenceless girlfriend in the head.

She was left with a bleed on the brain, two fractured vertebrae, a fractured eye socket which had to be reconstructed by surgery, damaged neck ligaments, black eyes and lips so swollen she was unable to open her mouth.

Neighbours had alerted police to the violence after Baxendale began his attack at a bus stop.

And when officers turned up at his flat in Briercliffe Road, Bolton, they found the woman, then 23, unconscious on the bed, her clothing torn and her blood splattered around the house.

She was so badly injured her three-year-old did not recognise her.

Baxendale later pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm with intent and was also given a four-year extended licence at his sentencing hearing by Judge Timothy Clayson.

He was imprisoned in December 2014 at Bolton Crown Court.

Preston Crown Court heard Baxendale’s relationship with the prison officer took place when she was working at Lancaster farms between November 3 last year and February 14.

Fallows, 23, was charged with misconduct. She committed the offence while serving as a prison officer between November 3, 2020 and February 14, 2021.

Judge Philip Parry told Fallows, of Goldsmith Street, 'the possibility of a custodial sentence will be something that will be at the forefront of my mind' when she is sentenced.

Baxendale, who appeared before the hearing by a prison video link, admitted to possession of a prohibited item - a mobile phone - at Lancaster Farms between October 1 and December 16 last year.

The court heard this item had been used to facilitate Fallows’s offence.

Judge Parry told Baxendale his offence would bring ‘an inevitable custodial sentence’.

Baxendale remains in custody and Fallows was bailed ahead of a sentencing hearing on February 11 at Preston.