Life behind bars at Capricornia Correctional Centre
One of Queensland’s highest security prisons is home to sadistic killers, serial rapists and drug traffickers and has seen riots involving molotov cocktails. See our exclusive video tour of where they live.
Rockhampton
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IT’S been home to killers, notorious serial rapists, drug traffickers and bikies.
The Capricornia Correctional Centre was built as a replacement for the Rockhampton Correctional Centre and opened on September 12, 2001.
The prison has undergone a $241 million expansion in recent years which has seen hundreds of extra cells and beds, and the employment of hundreds of extra staff.
More than $1 million in damage was done in October 2021 after about 70 prisoners rioted for more than 16 hours.
It began in the secure unit and culminated in significant damage to infrastructure, about 180 secure cells and 150 residential cells that could not be used and inmates armed with molotov cocktails.
Queensland Corrective Services officers who responded to protests were recognised for their bravery, with more than 150 officers receiving the Commissioner’s Unit Citation award.
Among those who have called the correctional centre home is Jimmy O’Brien, the Rockhampton Rebels Motorcycle Club bikie and former methamphetamines trafficker, who helped produce hundreds of kilograms of speed worth more than $28 million between 1997 and 2003.
In 2015, Justice Tim Carmody ordered O’Brien and a meth cook involved in the trafficking to forfeit $14 million each to the State of Queensland as proceeds of crime.
Other notorious inmates include:
Scott Andrew Jobling
Scott Jobling was sentenced in Mackay in 2005 for the murder of his ex-wife, which was facilitated by 20 year old university student Beau Hinschen.
Mr Jobling’s recruited Mr Hinschen to kill his ex-partner, threatening to kill him if he did not follow through.
She was found strangled with stab and cut wounds on her body in Rockhampton in 2005.
Peter Edward Bacon
In 2012, Peter Bacon was found guilty of the 2010 murder of his friend Paul Karran.
Mr Bacon was accused of killing Mr Karran in Gladstone in 2010 in a drunken rage, and was sentenced to 25 years in prison for murder.
James William Glenn
James Glenn murdered sex worker Shuxia Yuan, 52, with a fishing knife at a Gladstone motel in 2010.
Neighbours overheard the incident and moved Ms Yuan to the carpark to take her to hospital but she collapsed and died of a major blood loss.
Mr Glenn was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder in 2013.
Joseph Garrett Button
After a four year trial, Joseph Button was found guilty of the 2001 murders of two Rockhampton primary school children.
Mr Button strangled the children with rope, threw their bodies from a cliff and dropped rocks on their bodies.
He will be eligible for parole from November 2025.
Shaun Ross Andrew
Shaun Andrew was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of his ex-partner Joelean Watson in Gladstone in 2008.
Mr Andrew stabbed Ms Watson more than 25 times with a multi-tool knife in their home in Gladstone.
He then tried to take his own life, and the life of a two year old child but did not continue with the plan.
He was additionally sentenced for five years’ jail for the attempted murder of the child.
David Samuel Aubrey Ray
David Ray was charged for the murder and rape of a grandmother Iris Temperley, 82, after a neighbour saw him on top of her attacking her with a fire extinguisher in the backyard of her George Street, Rockhampton home on January 26 in 2010.
He was found guilty and received a life sentence, but the rape was overturned on appeal.
Horace Lorenzo Jones
Horace Jones was sentenced to life in 2014 after he used a steak knife and a samurai sword to stab his mother 25 times, slitting her throat and puncturing her heart as she pleaded with him to stop.
His sister told The Sunday Mail their home was plagued by domestic violence and they had repeatedly been placed in foster care then returned to their mother’s care.
Anthony James O’Keefe
Convicted murderer Anthony James O’Keefe allowed an inmate at Capricornia Correctional Centre to use his phone service to breach a domestic violence order in August 2022.
He received a life sentence in 2021 after he was found guilty in the Townsville Supreme Court for the murder of an elderly woman and trying to kill two others.
Arthur James Murdock
Serial rapist Arthur James Murdock, 79, spent most of his life in various prisons for rape, attempted rape and other violent offences and was described by a described him as “an aggressive sexual psychopath” in 1999.
A court was told Murdock committed violent acts against jail staff and officers in his early years behind bars and was kept in a cage for many years when he was jailed in Brisbane and Townsville prisons.
PRISON ESCAPES
This publication did not tour Capricornia Correctional Centre’s low security farm complex, which was commissioned in 1998.
Several prisoners have made desperate bids for freedom over the years and tasted success, albeit for short periods of time.
One escapee used a wheelie bin and doona to jump the barbed wire fence, only to be discovered naked running out of a cane paddock 36 hours later, while an escapee who lasted four weeks on the run had 934 days added to their sentence once they were captured.
As punishment for their escapades, the prisoners have either been moved to the high security section of the Capricornia Correctional Centre or to jails elsewhere in the state.
RAZOR WIRES, AIRLOCKS: LIFE INSIDE
Whether you are a prisoner, guard or visitor, the moment you set foot in Capricornia Correctional Centre cameras track your every move.
After walking past two fences of razor wire more than 3m high, an airlock traps you as it scans your biometrics, then releases you into a hallway leading to the prison itself.
No one is allowed to have phones at the Etna Creek facility, hidden off the Bruce Highway 21km north of Rockhampton.
Even prison officers entering the premises carry all of their items in clear bags which must be presented upon entry and exit to be X-rayed.
The jail has seen riots, deaths and notorious criminals.
None of its high security wards have escaped the jail’s walls.
“The entire prison is high security,” general manager Richard Butcher said.
This is despite it being split into two sections – secure and residential.
Largely, the difference between the two is the level of freedom allocated to the prisoners, and the amount of prisoners held in each.
Upon their arrival, prisoners are kept in holding cells while they await appointments with a psychologist and a nurse.
They are stripped and searched for any contraband, and are able to shower before changing into fresh prison clothing.
One officer said that this was sometimes a painful process for them, as some inmates were going through drug withdrawals at the time of their admittance.
“The centre is always very clean, and there’s not too much noise,” Mr Butcher said.
The prison boss says there are only about five incidents for the high security jail’s 700 prisoners.
They can range from verbal abuse to brawls.
“We have a team of prisoners who are employed to landscape, some are employed in the kitchens and the metal shop … we also have a laundry, where we wash items for the Rockhampton Base Hospital,” Mr Butcher said.
‘NO ONE HAS EVER ESCAPED’: THE SECURE SECTION
The secure accommodation at the prison is double storey, with 760 single and 967 built beds.
Each morning, prisoners are woken and numbers are checked, and each evening the process is repeated.
Guards secure prisoners away in heavy, magnetically-controlled doors.
The number of guards present at night is a fraction of how many are patrolling during the day, given prisoners are in their cells after dinner.
“No one has ever escaped (from the high security prison),” Mr Butcher said.
During the day, prisoners in the secure accommodation have access to an outdoor exercise area and two phones where they can call their loved ones.
RESIDENTIAL SECTION
The residential area allows the inmates more freedom, with most of them getting up to work within the prison and allowed to use kitchen facilities after the doors are locked.
Only a handful of guards oversee more than 350 inmates in this section and prison officers said maintaining a good rapport with the prisoners was the key to reducing conflict.
Queensland Corrective Services (QCS) would not provide the number of officers guarding the prisoners in residential and secure.
“A lot of the issues that we have can be de-escalated with a conversation,” one officer, who would not be named, said.
“Most of the people in the residential accommodation know that they have a good deal, and they don’t want to jeopardise it.”
Prisoners are also given access to a gym twice a week.
THE PERSON BEHIND THE OFFICER
Karan, whose last name cannot be provided for legal reasons, has been a prison officer for two years, following in his father’s footsteps.
“I worked as an engineer in the mines for years, but I wanted a work-life balance,” he said.
“When my father suggested corrections, I thought it was a good idea.
“A lot of people say they want to make a difference to the community, but doing this is actually making that difference.”
More than a quarter of prison officers across the state are women, according to QCS.
All walkways in the prison, from those joining the secure and residential accommodation, the gym, training rooms and reception, are completely fenced in. The widest opening in the wire would allow for only tiny sparrows to poke through.
Each Wednesday, inmates are locked up at midday to allow for staff training.
At these times, the prison is spotlessly clean and eerily quiet.
Mr Butcher said this was not out of the ordinary.
Despite First Nations people only representing about four per cent of the Australian population, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people make up more than 50 per cent of the prison population at the jail.
The prison has an on-site multicultural centre, where First Nations prisoners are able to interact with officers.
“We’re working to decrease the percentage of First Nations peoples in correctional centres,” Mr Butcher.
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