The library at the Alexander Maconochie Centre is “a supermarket” where any drug desired is freely available, says Canberra criminal lawyer ANDREW FRASER. But the shameful revelations don’t stop there. 

The ACT’s prison is run by a clique, with detainee bashings covered up, staff bullied into silence and the library better labelled “a supermarket” where any drug desired was freely available.

This is the picture that is being inked in by former detainees and staff who have shown the courage to come forward after recent publicity about the Alexander Maconochie Centre in Pearls and Irritations and CityNews.

There is a real convergence in what is being related from both sides.

One former detainee talks of management having a business case of “keeping as many in for as long as possible”, thereby pushing the case for prison expansion, and so more staff, and more union members.

The staff member spoke of the “Belconnen clique” still holding sway, those who ran the former Belconnen Remand Centre now occupying senior positions in the AMC and keeping the power within their group.

The common denominator was the absence of care for detainees.

I have been told of one staffer, who had reportedly worked more than four years in charge of one of the units of Goulburn’s Supermax, having not, in all that time, had to deploy force once because the focus had always been on interacting. That’s interacting with inmates of the notoriety of Ivan Milat, Bilal Skaf and Bassam Hamzy.

This officer had been surprised and saddened by the regularity of force applied by his new colleagues on the ACT’s less dangerous prison population.

One former detainee, who completed a long stretch about three years ago, told of being bashed by a well-known drug kingpin, an incident that got recorded by the authorities as the dealer having helped the bashed detainee, who had been officially listed as having suffered a slip, a dreadful accident.

The chilling reality had been that he had seen the drug dealer finish a phone call, knowing he would have to wait at least 10 minutes before he could have another one, and so asked if he might not use the phone in between. The barrage of blows that followed (leaving a suspected fractured skull) was seen, but the write-up praised the basher for assisting his (supposedly) fallen co-detainee.

Drugs were exchanged in the library (“you can get anything you want there”) as there was next to no supervision, and unwanted sexual advances were allowed and even facilitated, despite desperate pleas to have a particular detainee put on a “no-contact” list.

As for trying to get help, or raise the alarm, this detainee spoke of having written to former prison Inspector-General Neil McAllister, only to have his attachment separated from the letter and circulated among the guards.

Section 19 of the Custodial Inspector Act 2017 provides that the inspector may inspect any document relating to a detainee.

Section 26 provides a $16,000 fine and/or one year’s imprisonment for a person who takes detrimental action against another person who gives, or proposes to give, information, documents or evidence to the inspector for the Act.

Prison shame passes unnoticed on the campaign trail

One prison officer said the use of force on detainees had been declining over the past five years but that “mind games” were still sadly popular: paperwork would go missing, or detainees would be allowed to add a phone number to their list of approved callers only once or twice a month – not a lot of use if a person on remand was seeking advice about a fresh bail application.

The prison hierarchy was somewhat inverse. The more ostensibly senior (Corrective Service Officers Class 3 and 4) were often in administrative roles, leaving the actual running of the prison to CO2s and CO1s.

Detainee boredom is well-known as a major catalyst for trouble, like the recent burning of one AMC block. No wonder so many choose to shop at the drug library, which only adds to the problems.

One officer had proposed various schemes, including:

• A bricklaying course, where he was sure of support from the Housing Industry Association and the Master Builders Association.
• A driving simulator and training for those convicted of driving offences, many of whom were unlicensed or suspended or disqualified. With the cumulative nature of driving disqualifications, it was not uncommon for people to be ordered off the road for 20 and 30 years at time, setting up an impossible tension for a tradie with a strong work ethic in a town designed for the motor car.
• Computing, with the wry observation that sometimes the only access detainees had to a computer was the occasion when they stole the one which landed them where they were.

But nothing had come of his plans.

Just teaching reading and writing would make a substantial difference. He relayed the story of one lady who, simply off her own bat, has been visiting those in the AMC throughout its 16-year life, teaching numeracy and literacy.

The answer, from both officer ranks and the former detainee side, was in a rejuvenation of prison management. Not enough senior managers were seen as “prison people”.

The late Ron Woodham, almost invariably referred to as the “legendary gruff and tough NSW prison boss”, might not immediately have been seen as a shining example for the AMC.

But at least one officer begged to differ. He maintained that Woodham, the only guard ever to reach the top job in the NSW prison system and the man who invented the Supermax, “did have detainee welfare at heart”.

“It’s a tight line, prisons, between public interest and detainee welfare… to have less harm than when they came in.”

So, where to now?

Both the criminal-law committee of the ACT Law Society and the ACT Bar Association have been approached for comment.

Wouldn’t it be nice to hear that the new (or returned) attorney-general and/or corrections minister after Saturday’s ACT election had called for their first meeting to be with the committee chair and the association president?

First published at Pearls and Irritations.

Andrew Fraser is the principal of Fraser Criminal Law and has worked in criminal law in the Canberra region for more than 15 years. Before beginning legal practice, Andrew was a journalist for close to 30 years with the Canberra Times and the Sydney Morning Herald, including stints in the Federal Parliamentary Press Gallery. He is also a former news editor, chief of staff and political correspondent of the Canberra Times.

https://citynews.com.au/2022/prison-staff-shock-alleged-drug-parties-and-cover-ups/