Inside Goulburn Jail: How prisons deal with gangs to keep the peace
It is known as the “boneyard” — the place the worst of the worst prisoners are kept, ranging from Anita Cobby's murderers to killer aged care nurse Roger Dean. We take an exclusive look inside Goulburn Jail and how the staff control the diverse mix of inmates, including gang members.
NSW
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Prisoners call it “the boneyard” — where the worst of the worst are sent.
In Goulburn Jail, it is where Gary and Les Murphy, two of five men jailed over the brutal rape and murder of Sydney nurse Anita Cobby in 1987, are serving their sentences.
It is a bleak-looking building with rows of small, poorly lit cells where inmates spend 16 hours inside. Outside each steel door is the name and mugshot of the inmate.
The Murphy brothers, now in their 50s and 60s, look older than their years. Only their eyes look familiar.
A few cells along is former nurse Roger Dean, who is serving a life sentence for the murder of 11 elderly residents after he set fire to a western Sydney nursing home as they slept in 2011.
Also here is Andrew Garforth, who abducted, raped and drowned nine-year-old Ebony Simpson in Bargo in 1992. Nearby is Michael Murdoch, another Cobby killer.
The official name of the “boneyard” is the Special Management Area Placement unit — or “SMAPs” — where inmates who would be at risk if not separated from where other inmates are placed.
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Rapists. Child killers. Paedophiles. Prisoners at the bottom of the jail pecking order. And, once relegated to the boneyard, it’s impossible to get out, Goulburn Intelligence Officer Scott Ryan said.
“Once you’ve been labelled, you can never come back to the mainstream,” Mr Ryan said.
Even moving to another jail can be dangerous, as Gary Murphy found out in June last year when he was brutally assaulted after being sent to Long Bay Jail for a medical appointment.
But it is not just the protected prisoners who must never mix with other inmates — there are rival outlaw motorcycle gangs, feuding criminal families and rival organised crime associates who — if put together — would result in bloodshed.
With every new “freshie” that comes in, it is Goulburn classification manager Shane McColl who must play a daily game of prison Tetris.
“Every single day there will be inmates moved around because of their associations,” he said.
The Sunday Telegraph was granted an exclusive walk through Goulburn Jail last week, a prison with a reputation of being the toughest in the state.
Dubbed “The Killing Fields” in the 1990s after seven murders in three years, the jail has turned a corner in inmate management with acting governor Glen Piazza attributing that to his staff.
“We haven’t had a murder in long, long time,” the former Supermax security manager said.
“That’s a credit to our staff.”
And that was despite the jail still “taking anyone”.
“We’ll deal with anything,” Mr Piazza said.
“Nobody is turned away.”
This means prisoners who don’t fit in anywhere else. But Mr Piazza said many returned inmates preferred Goulburn because it was so regimented.
“They like the structured routine,” he said.
“It is a very controlled environment. They know what to expect each day and we are very upfront with them about any changes.”
Given the horrendous crimes that some of those in Goulburn have committed, there would be little public sympathy towards prisoners beating each other up.
But keeping the peace was as much about protecting staff as the duty of care to inmates. As well as intelligence from police and the community, new inmates were also asked to volunteer their “enemies within”.
It was also not uncommon for an officer to be slipped an anonymous note, forewarning of impending “problems”.
While Goulburn has 12 yards, inmates are juggled around the state’s network.
OMCG members are almost always imprisoned at different jails. One of the most loathed, The Finks, are in Goulburn.
According to prison sources, the The Lone Wolfs and Hells Angels are at Shortland jail in Cessnock, while the Comanchero and some members of the Rebels are at Lithgow. The Nomads were imprisoned at both the South Coast Correctional Centre and Long Bay.
One prison source said Wellington jail was the “home” of the Rebels, with “a couple of Comanchero”.
The last time bikies were mixed, five prison officers were injured after members of Notorious set upon a jailed Bandido at Parklea prison.
In one Goulburn cell, the word “Bloodlines” is scrawled across a wall. It is the name of an older Pacific Islander gang aligned with that of a gang in the US.
Tensions between Bloodlines members and that of the “OCs”, or Outkasts, a group of younger Pacific Islanders, mean members of each are also separated.
Other prison gangs include “OneFour” and the“Hooligan Hefs”, a group from Western Sydney named after a popular rapper.
Members of the feuding Bankstown and Blacktown Brothers For Life chapters are juggled around the system, as are members of the Alameddine family and those of Brothers For Life founder Bassam Hamzy.
Tensions of the “balance of power” between Hamzy and Talal Alameddine boiled over last year with the violent gangster and convicted terrorist laying into each other, a brawl captured on CCTV.
Prison officers said family members are often kept apart so as not to form a “power base” in prison.
ISIS and al-Qaeda supporters are “okay together to a point” but followers of the former tended to be younger and more impatient, which can lead to tensions.
Corrections Minister Anthony Roberts said imprisoning an offender could be a complex process but there was only one objective.
“Our responsibility is to ensure a prisoner serves the entire sentence,” he said.
Originally published as Inside Goulburn Jail: How prisons deal with gangs to keep the peace