IT WAS meant to be a pleasant drive in the country with a spot of lunch on the way.
Instead, it ended up as a security nightmare for a group of 12 pensioners who mistakenly found their way into the maximum security Kariong juvenile detention centre at Gosford, thinking it was a coffee shop. The incident occurred in March this year when a driver transporting the group lost his way.
The bus tour ended outside the gates of Kariong with the driver assuming he had arrived at their destination and the guard on duty presuming they were meant to be there.
Then, in a complete breakdown of security, they were let through two drive-through electronic barriers.
The pensioners then alighted from the bus and were allowed walk-through entry through three more gates before finding themselves deep inside the grounds of the detention centre.
"A staff member confronted them and they asked 'where is the coffee shop?' " a Kariong employee told The Daily Telegraph.
"They ended up in the compound where inmates are housed. There was a possibility that they could have come into contact with inmates."
The NSW Opposition yesterday released details of the incident to highlight detention centre workers' concerns about security, use of casual staff and what some claim was a soft approach to detainees in the state's only maximum security juvenile detention centre.
Staff are threatening a walkout after an incident two weeks ago where an inmate from the Carinya unit of the centre which houses the state's 12 worst juvenile offenders set a staff member on fire.
"I honestly believe we are at a point where someone will be killed," the Kariong employee said.
http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story.jsp?sectionid=1260&storyid=1931291
Instead, it ended up as a security nightmare for a group of 12 pensioners who mistakenly found their way into the maximum security Kariong juvenile detention centre at Gosford, thinking it was a coffee shop. The incident occurred in March this year when a driver transporting the group lost his way.
The bus tour ended outside the gates of Kariong with the driver assuming he had arrived at their destination and the guard on duty presuming they were meant to be there.
Then, in a complete breakdown of security, they were let through two drive-through electronic barriers.
The pensioners then alighted from the bus and were allowed walk-through entry through three more gates before finding themselves deep inside the grounds of the detention centre.
"A staff member confronted them and they asked 'where is the coffee shop?' " a Kariong employee told The Daily Telegraph.
"They ended up in the compound where inmates are housed. There was a possibility that they could have come into contact with inmates."
The NSW Opposition yesterday released details of the incident to highlight detention centre workers' concerns about security, use of casual staff and what some claim was a soft approach to detainees in the state's only maximum security juvenile detention centre.
Staff are threatening a walkout after an incident two weeks ago where an inmate from the Carinya unit of the centre which houses the state's 12 worst juvenile offenders set a staff member on fire.
"I honestly believe we are at a point where someone will be killed," the Kariong employee said.
http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story.jsp?sectionid=1260&storyid=1931291
