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Chapter 9 The Emergence of the Supermax in New Zealand Greg Newbold It has been said that the era of the modern “supermax” began in 1979, when the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) designated a special “level 6” security category for USP Marion, in southern Illinois (Ross 2007b). Although Marion had been constructed during a relatively liberal era in American corrections and provided a range of programs to its 350 inmates, a series of escape attempts, serious assaults, and the murders of ten inmates and two staff in the early 1980s led to a state of emergency declaration in October 1983 and general lockdown. The institution remained locked down until 2007, when it ceased to function as a maximum-security facility. During its lockdown years, Marion provided only basic services to its topsecurity prisoners (Haney 2005). The reasons for Marion’s lockdown and the level 6 designation have been widely discussed (e.g., Consultants’ Report 1985; Shalev 2009). Six years after Marion opened, in March 1969, New Zealand commissioned a new maximum-security prison at Paremoremo, twenty miles north of its largest city, Auckland (population one million). The prison was built based on the telegraph-pole design, as the architects of what is now known as Auckland Prison East Division (colloquially termed Paremoremo Maximum or Parry Max) had used USP Marion as a model for their own design. Utilizing the most sophisticated technology available at the time, Paremoremo, when it opened, was one of the most advanced and physically secure institutions in the world. Despite the security emphasis, for most of its first two decades Paremoremo epitomized correctional liberalism, offering a wide variety of programs, services, and facilities to its two hundred prisoners. The current author was incarcerated there during this progressive period and studied for an MA degree. After 1984, however, facilities began to decline sharply, reaching 111 a nadir in 1989. Since this point, Paremoremo prison, like Marion, has been on lockdown status, with prisoners contained in their cells upward of 21.5 hours a day and their movement highly restricted. Security is paramount, there is no work availability for inmates, and convicts are escorted by staff whenever they leave their cell landings. The management of this maximumsecurity facility today is in complete contrast to what it was thirty years ago. The purpose of this chapter is to explain the decision to build Paremoremo and to show why it was gradually transformed from a liberally run exemplar of correctionalism in the 1970s to one of model custodialism in the 2000s. As will be seen, the history of the prison in many ways follows, and was influenced by, that of Marion. However, the dynamics of Paremoremo also differ from those of American supermaxes in several important respects. Establishment of Paremoremo Although the building of a new maximum-security prison had been contemplated for some time, it was a destructive three-day riot at the eightyfive -year-old top-security prison at Mount Eden, Auckland, in July 1965 that prompted the New Zealand government to expedite the construction of a replacement. The new facility was designed and built during one of the most progressive decades in the nation’s correctional history (Newbold 2007), and this atmosphere pervaded its planning. The philosophy behind the institution was that very high levels of physical security would permit a wide range of activities and programs within a safe perimeter. Accordingly, the prison’s five cell blocks (A, B, C, D, and Classification—known as “Class”) contained only forty-eight men each, in single internal cells. Bars were made of hardened cutting-tool-proof steel, cell doors were opened remotely, and access to cell blocks and other key areas was via electronic sally ports, operated from an armor-plated central control unit equipped with closed-circuit television and an intercom. Prisoners never ventured outside the cell blocks for recreation , but each block had daily access to its own concrete exercise yard, enclosed by twenty-foot-high grapple-proof walls with electric trip wires. The entire complex was surrounded by high, twin, close-mesh fences with unarmed sentry towers on each corner, manned twenty-four hours a day. During its four years of construction, the minister of justice provided regular progress reports to the media, emphasizing the secure nature of the place and the high standard of amenities that would be provided. The cells would be light and airy, each equipped with a flush toilet, hot and cold running water, and a three-station radio. The...

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