The prisoner who is alleged to have escaped custody during a dramatic and violent Manuka incident in which a Corrections car was chased down and rammed was likely provided with a hospital appointment time which may have been passed on to someone outside the prison without the knowledge of prison staff.
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The former senior director of Operations at Canberra's jail has alleged the dangerous incident, now the subject of an official investigation by the Inspector of Correctional Services, was one of many which have continually put prison officers at grave risk.
During the July incident, prisoner Kane Quinn was being transported back from an appointment at The Canberra Hospital when the Toyota Camry sedan in which he was being conveyed was tailed by a Jeep and rammed multiple times as members of the public were forced to take evasive action on Canberra's streets.
The car was eventually forced off the road in Manuka where Quinn allegedly escaped custody, climbed into the Jeep and fled the scene.
Quinn has pleaded not guilty over the incident and is yet to face court on his additional charges of escaping lawful custody, while his alleged accomplice Lila Walto is yet to enter a plea.
Walto faces three counts of assaulting a front-line community service provider and one count each of dangerous driving, driving while suspended, stealing a car, crashing and not giving details to the other driver, and damage to property.
The stolen white Jeep was found torched in Forrest a short time after the incident. Quinn was later found inside the roof cavity of a house in Manuka.
The report into the incident by the independent Inspector has been completed but is now sitting with the Justice and Community Services (JACS) directorate and the Minister for Corrective Services, Mick Gentleman, for their comment before it is tabled in the ACT Assembly.
JACS refused to comment on the former director's allegations "because the matter is still before the court".
During the dramatic and dangerous incident, which was in part captured by dashcam footage, the Jeep driver repeatedly rammed the Camry until it peeled off part of the car's rear bumper. Two Corrections officers required medical attention afterward and the Toyota sedan sustained extensive damage.
Why the prisoner was being conveyed in a conventional passenger sedan and how the travel arrangements may have been leaked are among the many questions which are assessed in the inspector's forthcoming report.
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In correspondence provided to The Canberra Times, the former senior director at the Alexander Maconochie Centre said that officers had continually identified the risks with prisoners being supplied their appointment details but he said nothing was done to address their concerns.
He has alleged that this was not the "not the first incident" in relation to hospital escorts.
He claimed that the absurdity of "prisoners being addressees to the appointments arranged by hospitals" and the "inherent and obvious risk" of doing so had been raised with the senior executive Corrections team and ACT Health, but ignored.
"In no other jurisdiction I've worked in are prisoners given advance notification," he said.
The incident was one in a litany of recent issues which have afflicted Canberra's maximum security prison which have included two recent riots costing over $10 million in repairs, a drug drone delivery, and the switch-out of the former head of Corrections, Jon Peach, from the top job into a more low-profile role within JACS after criticism over his handling of the November 2020 riot.
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