Parklea prison officer Tara Brooks convicted over ‘intimate relationship’ with inmate
Sacked prison officer and bikini model Tara Brooks has been convicted over having an “intimate relationship” with an inmate who was serving time for the commercial supply of cocaine.
True Crime
Don't miss out on the headlines from True Crime. Followed categories will be added to My News.
- Accused Rebels bikie in court over police chase
- Bikini model prison guard sent cocaine dealer ‘love card’
A Stanhope Gardens prison officer has been convicted over having an “intimate relationship” with an inmate.
Tara Brooks, 34, pleaded guilty to one count of engaging in an intimate relationship with inmate Hassan Zreika at Parklea Correctional Centre between December 2018 and February 2019.
Police said Zreika and Brooks had daily contact, with the relationship developing over the phone and through letter writing.
Brooks was sentenced in Blacktown Local Court today after an application to have the matter dealt with under the mental health act was refused.
Citing a psychological report prepared for the court, Magistrate Leanne Robinson said Brooks had been diagnosed with an adjustment disorder, anxiety and depression, which had arisen since the offence.
The report found Brooks also had several pre-existing psychological conditions, including ADHD, a depressive disorder and symptoms of PTSD, which resulted in variations in her self-perception and feelings of being “incomplete, unfulfilled and inadequate”.
Ms Robinson found there to be a degree of planning involved in Brooks’ conduct, relating to the opening of a PO Box to receive mail and the use of a false name.
The defence argued Brooks’ mental health had suffered significantly as a result of the media attention surrounding the case.
“There’s been a significant amount of media attention which has caused her harm,” the defence said.
A request from the defence for the court to not record a conviction was rejected, with Ms Robinson sentencing Brooks to a Conditional Release Order, with a conviction recorded, for two years.
Ms Robinson said there was no evidence to suggest the relationship had been of a physical nature.
Police documents showed in December 2018, Brooks opened a PO box at the Stanhope Gardens Post Office where she used the “covert alias” Belinda Taylor to receive letters from Zreika.
In late January 2019, a mobile phone was found in Zreika’s cell at Parklea Correctional Centre, which was used to make unauthorised phone calls to Brooks.
On February 12, a further search found letters and a Valentine’s Day card, which police say disclosed the “clear romantic involvement between the pair”.
The following day, Brooks was arrested and made “full and frank admissions to writing and receiving letters and pursuing a romantic relationship’.
Brooks also told police she had been the recipient of multiple phone calls from Zreika over several weeks and that she was aware it was illegal for him to possess the phone.
Documents tendered to the court said Brooks felt she was unable to report the possession of the mobile phone due to her “compromised integrity”.
Brooks was employed as a correctives officer at the prison in August 2016.
Zreika was sentenced to serve a minimum of two years and five months at the prison in November 2016 for the commercial supply of 926g of cocaine (worth about $278,000 on the street) and dealing with $45,000, which was the proceeds of crime.
He was also caught in possession of testosterone and the steroid nandrolone
Court papers showed Zreika was a “sweeper” at the prison, performing cleaning duties, distributing meals and clothing.
It was through this role that Brooks and Zreika had daily contact and “got to know each other,” the papers read.
In December 2018, Zreika was reclassified as minimal security and it is in this same month that the intimate relationship between the pair began.
Police said in February Zreika asked Brooks to be his girlfriend, to which she accepted.
Brooks was supported in court today by her parents, holding her mother’s hand and crying as her sentence was handed down.
The court heard the matter was one of the first to come to court after the NSW Government in November 2018 made it an offence for prison staff to engage in intimate or sexual relationships with inmates.
Brooks was ordered to continue receiving psychological treatment and attend counselling as a condition of her sentence.
Her criminal record showed she was charged with shoplifting in 2004, however, the case was dismissed at Parramatta Local Court the same year.
Originally published as Parklea prison officer Tara Brooks convicted over ‘intimate relationship’ with inmate
Ex-Melbourne private schoolboy sentenced for bashing wife
Damien Carew, a graduate of the elite St Kevin’s College in Toorak, has learned his fate over charges for repeated domestic violence against his Russian wife.
Mum believed slain baby was a demon: court
A mentally ill mother believed her 10-month-old son was a demon and didn’t know what she was doing when she fatally restricted his breathing, a court has been told.