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Police are investigating after a counsellor allegedly tried to bring drugs into an Auckland prison ahead of an appointment with an inmate.
The contracted counsellor had a scheduled appointment with an inmate at Kohuora Auckland South Corrections Facility in Wiri on Friday morning.
They were stopped at the prison’s gatehouse checking area, where staff allegedly found what was suspected to be meth and cannabis on the counsellor.
Staff at the prison, privately run by Serco under contract to Corrections, called police.
The counsellor was arrested at the scene and taken away.
Serco confirmed in a statement a contractor was arrested on Friday morning after what its spokeswoman described as an “unknown substance” was found in their bag.
“The good order, safety and security of Kohuora is our highest priority,” the statement said.
“Contraband is a challenge facing all New Zealand prisons, and we are constantly vigilant in preventing contraband from entering the prison.”
A police spokesman said they couldn’t comment because the incident is subject to an ongoing investigation.
The house block at Wiri's Auckland South Correction Facility, operated by Secro.
ACC funds and approves counsellors but does not directly employ them, its deputy chief executive prevention and partnerships Tane Cassidy said.
“We had not been made aware of any incident of this nature,” Cassidy said.
“If a provider had been involved in such an incident, our usual expectations are that the supplier would notify us straight away, suspend the provider’s contract and take immediate action to support the ACC clients that usually see that provider.”
It is far from the first time people working inside Kiwi prisons have been implicated in contraband smuggling.
Last year, five staff members at Rimutaka Prison in Upper Hutt were stood down amid a lengthy police corruption probe.
Allegations against staff included smuggling contraband, inappropriately accessing prisoner information and failing to maintain professional boundaries.
The Upper Hutt prison is the subject of a long-running police investigation into what the Department of Corrections dubs “integrity concerns”.
Last year, a prison psychologist who smuggled music CDs to an inmate she was in a sexual relationship with was barred from practising for three years.
George Block is an Auckland-based reporter with a focus on police, the courts, prisons and defence. He joined the Herald in 2022 and has previously worked at Stuff in Auckland and the Otago Daily Times in Dunedin.
