In the weeks leading up to October last year — when Christchurch Men’s Prison’s 100-
year-old unit was decommissioned — 69 high-security prisoners were transported south to the Otago Corrections Facility (OCF).
The Milburn institution, 50km southwest of Dunedin, is now the only jail in the South Island equipped to hold sentenced prisoners deemed high-security.
To make room for those new inmates, OCF has transferred 55 low-security inmates to Rolleston and there are plans for 24 more to head north imminently.
Corrections Association of New Zealand secretary Mark Duncan said sending people away from their support networks raised clear safety concerns.
"If you look at violence and aggression, when does a prisoner play up? When do they get violent? You take someone away from their family ... that’s when they start getting angry."
Just as concerning was the decrease in low-security beds at OCF, which meant if a prisoner’s risk level dropped during their stay behind bars, they may be sent to another prison or double-bunked.
"I believe in prison you’ve got to have progression ... You’ve got to have a pathway they can see if they comply.
"If you don’t have the beds available then you have to double-bunk and we know from experience that can turn to custard very quickly."
David William Clarke is more than five years into a 15-year term for extensive and repeated violations of a young girl.
After hearing he was one of the low-security prisoners to be transferred away from OCF, he sought a judicial review of Corrections’ decision.
At a hearing last month in the High Court at Dunedin, his lawyer, Adriana Pinnock, argued the department had no regard to the fact Clarke would be isolated from his partner and son if he was sent north.
The man said the transfer would have a "tremendous impact on his mental and emotional well being".
OCF director Dave Miller provided an affidavit to the court explaining the "big picture".
When prisoners were slated for transfer, staff considered court dates, Parole Board hearings, rehabilitation programmes, employment and health status, he said.
Justice Jonathan Eaton accepted Clarke’s family would suffer distress because of his move to Rolleston, but it was not enough to reverse Corrections’ decision.
"This court will appropriately be reluctant to intervene in a prisoner transfer in any case where staff-prisoner ratio and consequential safety issues are raised."
While he declined the interim bid to prohibit Clarke’s transfer, the case will be argued in full later.
Should the prisoner’s legal bid be successful, he could be transferred back to OCF, Justice Eaton said.
