Bikini model prison guard Tara Brooks convicted over affair with inmate
A former prison guard and part-time bikini model has been convicted over an “intimate” relationship with an inmate in a Sydney jail.
Bikini model and prison guard Tara Brooks had become the girlfriend behind bars to a drug dealer inmate in a liaison that was headed for a full-blown sexual relationship, a court has heard.
The former pole dancer and aspiring actress, who wept as she pleaded guilty in court, had pursued a “romantic relationship” with convicted drug offender Hassan Zreika, Blacktown Local Court was told.
Documents seen by news.com.au say that “in late January or early February Zreika asked her to be his girlfriend and she accepted”.
A mental health assessement of the 34-year-old found she felt “incomplete, unfulfilled and inadequate” which my have led “to a romanticised view” of her and the drug dealer.
Police prosector Sergeant Mobit Kumar said Brooks had criminally acted with the prisoner to hide that he had obtained a mobile phone — which was illegal prison contraband.
Zreika made “multipe phone calls ... over several weeks” to Brooks and she failed to report she knew he was doing so on the banned phone.
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Addressing the court, where Brooks sat looking strained and clasping her hands tightly in her lap, Sergeant Kumar said her actions were the sort that caused “public outrage”.
Dressed in a cream and black checked jacket and mini-skirt, wearing black stilettos, pearl earrings, her hair drawn up in a tight bun and a silver cross around her neck, Brooks wept as Magistrate Leanne Robinson rejected her mental health plea and recorded a conviction.
Sergeant Kumar said while Brooks’ relationship with drug dealer Hassan Zreika “wasn’t a full blown intimate relationship as to physical activity, it was an intimate relationship”.
“An intimate relationship can be a precursor to sexual conduct including physical expressions of affection or an exchange of written and other communications,” he told Ms Robinson.
“The facts do suggest she tried to develop these feelings.”
Police facts reveal Brooks started working in the maximum security Area 5 at Parklea Correctional Centre in September last year.
Hassan Zreika was incarcerated there and worked as a prison “sweeper”, a privileged position cleaning, distributing meals, clothing and linen to other inmates which gave him greater access to the jail and contact with officers.
“They had daily contact with each other where they began to get to know each other,” the facts state.
By December 2018, Zreika had been recassified as a minimum security inmate and moved to Area 4 at Parklea.
In the same month, Brooks opened a post office box account in her own name, but which she received letters from Zreika in jail written to the “covert alias” of Belinda Taylor.
Between last December and January this year, “the relationship progressed into a relationship that transgressed the professional inmate/correctional officer boundary”.
A search of Area 4 in January uncovered a mobile phone and SIM card, and a search of Zreika’s cell on February 12 found letters and a Valentine’s Day card written by Brooks “that ... disclosed clear romantic involvement between the pair”.
The Corrective Services NSW Investigations Unit went to her home where she was arrested the day before Valentine’s Day this year.
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In a recorded police interview, Brooks “made full and frank admissions to writing and receiving letters and pursuing a romantic relationship with Zreika”.
Brooks was charged with a new offence, introduced by the NSW Government last December, of engage in relationship with inmate cause safety risk to correctional centre.
She also admitted she knew it was illegal for Zreika to possess a mobile phone in prison, and that she hadn’t reported it due to her “compromised integrity”.
She revealed that she had accepted his request to become “his girlfriend”.
She told police she was aware she had “crossed the line”.
Quoting at length from the parlaimentary Hansard report of the legislation, Sergeant Kumar said “public outrage” had led to its introduction and that the community expected professionalism and high standards from prison officers.
He said actions such as hers “cause significant distress to victims of offenders and undermine public confidence in the the administration of justice”.
Defence lawyers for Brooks argued she had underlying mental health issues such as “adjustment disorder, depressive disorder and ADHD”.
They also said she had suffered because of media exposure and public humiliation.
Ms Robinson said the mental health conditions did “not diminish the moral culpability of the offender” and sentenced her to a two-year conditional release order.
Brooks was sentenced under new legislation in NSW and lost her job as a corrections officer.
She must be of good behaviour for the next two years and continue counselling.
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