Violent criminal subject to heavy scrutiny upon release from jail under new Tasmanian laws

A violent prisoner with a history of throwing faeces is believed to be the first person dubbed a ‘high risk offender’ under new laws – but concerns are held about increased state powers under the legislation. FULL STORY >>

Risdon Prison. Picture: Zak Simmonds

An unhinged Risdon Prison inmate with a history of throwing faeces and urine in the faces of guards, police officers and fellow prisoners has been declared a “high risk offender” under new Tasmanian laws.

Nathan Michael Green, 36, has spent most of his adult life behind bars over dozens of brutal and disturbingly violent assaults.

The Crown has previously tried – and failed – to convince the courts to declare him a “dangerous criminal”, which would give the state the power to incarcerate him without release.

However, on Monday, Supreme Court judge Gregory Geason made an order deeming Green a high risk offender for five years – giving the state and Tasmania Police much more power to monitor him upon his release from prison.

It’s understood it’s the first time in Tasmanian history such an order has been made since the legislation was introduced by the state government in 2021.

Risdon Prison. Picture: Zak Simmonds

Justice Geason said he was convinced there was evidence Green would continue to commit high risk offences unless such an order was made “to place the safety of the community at front-and-centre”.

The order means Green could be subject to mandatory reporting, conditions on where he lives, and the power for police to enter and search his residence.

It also means he could be subject to further conditions imposed by the court, including electronic monitoring, curfews and prohibitions on entering certain places.

Prisoners Legal Service Tasmania chair Greg Barns SC denounced the use of high risk offenders orders.

“It’s effectively a form of imprisonment in the community,” he said.

“We’re opposed to it because we’re of the view that preventive detention is an anathema to the rule of law, which says you should only be punished for crimes that have been proven you have committed.”

He also raised concerns about the extra policing powers provided by high risk offenders orders, including the power to enter and search a person’s home “upon a whim”.

View of Risdon Prison. Picture: SAM ROSEWARNE.

“Police are notorious for abusing powers that enable them, upon a whim, to search people, detain them. So in the absence of strong independent scrutiny of police actions, that’s another concerning aspect of this,” he said.

Green’s history of violence includes breaking a policeman’s jaw by punching it, assaulting six prison guards in the same year, and stabbing a guard in the jaw with a makeshift weapon.

In 2014, he seriously injured a convicted murderer who’d made sexual advances toward him, hitting his head and body with a cricket bat 13 times.

The same year, he smashed a microwave glass plate over another prisoner’s head then used a shard to stab him in the chest.

In 2017, he caused $16,000 worth of damage in a prison common room, smashing items with a baseball bat including the ceiling sprinklers, and didn’t stop until he was restrained by Tactical Response officers.

Green has not been found to be mentally ill, but is said to have anti-social personality disorder and is of “borderline” intelligence.

Follow @ambervwilson