Guard kept rifle at home after threats by inmates

Diaz Henry Minisita was a guard at the Auckland Central Remand Prison in Mt Eden. Photo / Doug Sherring

A prison guard kept a sawn-off .22 rifle hidden in his house and told police he had it for protection after being threatened by inmates.

Diaz Henry Minisita, 31, pleaded guilty to two charges of smuggling tobacco into the Auckland Central Remand Prison in Mt Eden and one of unlawfully possessing a pistol when he appeared in the Auckland District Court yesterday.

The cut-down rifle was 48cm long, and is classed as a pistol under the Arms Act.

Police said Minisita was caught with a packet of tobacco in October. He had intended to give it to an inmate with whom he had once played rugby league.

Minisita admitted to police that he had smuggled tobacco for the same inmate on a previous occasion.

Police have accepted that no money changed hands.

When police raided his Blockhouse Bay house last month, they found the sawn off .22 rifle wrapped in two plastic bags and hidden in a bench seat with five bullets.

Minisita said he had acquired it for protection after receiving threats from inmates, police said.

He told police the gun had been cut down before he got it but he could not remember where he got it from.

Outside the court Minisita's lawyer Tudor Clee said: "The case highlights the pressures and challenges implicit in this line of work."

Minisita was fired from the Corrections Department last month.

Corrections assistant regional manager Grace Smit said Minisita did not alert prison officials to any threats from inmates.

Minisita will be sentenced in March.

The maximum penalty for making "unauthorised deliveries" is one year in prison or a $2000 fine and the maximum sentence for unlawful possession of a pistol is three years in prison or a $4000 fine.

Another prison officer, 33-year-old Halo Tavana, has pleaded guilty to six charges of smuggling drugs wrapped in tape, tobacco, an icecream container of food and a cellphone into the Auckland Central Remand Prison for inmates.

Tavana is due to be sentenced next month.