28 February 2007
“The investigation has cleared Public Prisons Staff working at Rotorua Court cells of corruption allegations. To quote from the report “there is no evidence to support the allegations of corruption on the part of Public Prisons Service (PPS staff) at the Rotorua Court Cells”.
The fact that there is no substance to the allegations reported to the Sunday Star Times three week’ ago is pleasing”, said Corrections Chief Executive Barry Matthews.
The vast majority of PPS staff are totally professional in their approach to managing prisoners despite the difficult environment they work in.
The public can be assured that I take all allegations of this nature seriously and will ensure each is investigated thoroughly. The public have the right to be assured that our prison service is being run competently.
The investigation was undertaken by my Internal Audit team, who report directly to me and are independent of the Public Prison Service.