Corrections officer found not guilty of pepper spraying inmate

Thursday, 25 January 2024

The senior corrections officer on trial accused of assaulting an inmate in a mental health unit with pepper spray, has been found not guilty. But the jury were not told the inmate died.

In footage shown to the jury the inmate is heard telling the officer: “Why did you do this to me? I can’t see brother, please.” That’s the last the jury saw of the inmate. What can be revealed now is just 20 minutes after that, he died.

Over the last week, jurors deciding the case heard from a number of corrections officers, including the accused, about the incident on April 5, 2022 at Mt Eden Corrections Facility.

The trial came down to the issue of whether or not the corrections officer was legally justified in using the pepper spray against the inmate, who was refusing to hand back a towel.

The Crown said he wasn’t, but the defence said he was and was acting in self-defence and in defence of other officers around.

However, after four hours of deliberations the jury ultimately agreed with the officer and found him not guilty.

What the jury didn’t know was that the inmate died 20 minutes later after he’d been restrained by other officers. The fact he died had been deemed prejudicial ahead of trial.

Stuff understands attempts were made to decontaminate the prisoner, before he was taken to his cell and officers placed him on his stomach and uncuffed him in a tactical exit.

However, officers noticed he wasn’t breathing and was unable to be revived.

No-one has been charged over his death and an inquest is yet to be heard.

CCTV and body camera footage played the moments leading up to the inmate being pepper sprayed.

The inmate, who also has interim suppression, was housed in the Intervention and Support Unit (ISU), set up for prisoners with high mental health needs.

He’d been moved there the day before.

On April 5, he was let out of his cell for a shower and was handed two towels by a corrections officer.

As he came out of the shower, he handed one towel back to a corrections officer, while the other was wrapped around his waist.

While the inmate was waiting for his cell to be cleaned, he walked over to a nearby trolley and picked up another towel and wiped his face and hair, CCTV footage shows.

ISU prisoners aren’t allowed to take towels or other items into their cells for safety reasons, however the inmate was outside his cell at this point.

The corrections officer on trial then told the inmate to hand back the towels, he refused and began walking back passively.

Prosecutor Kristy Li told the jury in closing, the corrections officer hadn’t made any attempt to de-escalate the situation when he pepper sprayed after raising his voice despite the inmate showing no signs of aggression and saying “I understand”.

“This was not done in self defence or defence of someone else and not reasonable in the circumstances when all [the inmate] had done was not hand back a towel,” Li said.

The Crown case is the officer did not act in self-defence as there was no threat.

“It is plainly obvious [the inmate’s] tone is far from aggressive, he quietly and softly attempted to tell [another corrections officer] he felt threatened.”

There’s no doubt working in a prison is a difficult job and managing different people’s needs can be tricky, especially with no training in dealing with those with mental health issues, Li said.

However, she said the corrections officer had been working in the ISU unit for about 18 months and would have know care needs to be taken when communicating with someone with mental health issues.

But the corrections officer’s lawyer, Petrina Stokes, said her client was just doing his job.

“This was an unexpected and fast evolving incident in an inherently high-risk environment.”

While the incident all took place in the space of 45 seconds, Stokes said a lot can happen in that time period. He had also witnessed two previous self-harm incidents and told the jury he was concerned the inmate would use the towel as a weapon.

Stokes said the officer acted in accordance with his training. He felt threatened and feared for his and his colleagues safety.

She submitted the inmate blatantly disobeyed orders multiple times, including lawful orders and after being warned he’d be pepper sprayed.

“In those circumstances the deploying of the pepper spray was in defence of himself and others and was the safest option when physical force is being considered.”