Tue 2 Aug 2016 In: Our Communities View at Wayback View at NDHA
Once again this year, trans prisoner rights have come into the spotlight, most recently a young woman and ex-inmate revealed that she had been groped on more than one occasion during a strip search. Allegations of sexual assault and rape have been made time and again by trans prisoners, the last was made in March and Police say the allegations made at that time are being investigated. Corrections declared their own internal investigation “found no substance to the allegations”. In October last year, Police and Corrections were investigating claims that a prisoner was raped by a cellmate while locked in overnight at Serco-run men's prison, Auckland South Corrections Facility. Strip searches were a key topic at the Equal Justice Project forum held in May and claims that prisons are unsafe for trans prisoners were made by the speakers. A Corrections spokesperson responded to the allegations saying “Strip searches are conducted in accordance with the provisions of the Corrections Act, and our staff are carefully trained to conduct them. The searches are carried out with decency and sensitivity, and every effort is made to ensure that the person’s privacy and dignity is maintained.” The spokesperson went on to say that they “demand a high standard of conduct and integrity from all employees and staff are expected to role model positive law-abiding behaviour.” On the subject of strip searches, Section 94(1) of the Corrections Act 2004 states that “A rub-down or strip search may be carried out only by a person of the same sex as the person to be searched, and no strip search may be carried out in view of any person who is not of the same sex as the person to be searched.” In practice however, according to Corrections, transgender prisoners who are placed in a prison that does not match their gender identity are faced with a strip search carried out by a member of the opposite gender. A correlation between strip searches and sexual assault was a key point made at the Equal Justice Project Forum and has again been raised following the latest allegations made by ex-inmate Jade Follett. Strip searches are conducted when a prisoner first arrives to prison, immediately before the prisoner is transferred to another prison, when the prisoner is received in a prison on transfer from another prison, or leaves or returns to or from a prison for outside employment, court appearances, medical appointments, or any other reason in accordance with the Corrections Act 2004. Because of the circumstances under which they are carried out, all prisoners at some point will be subject to a strip search. Emmy Rākete of No Pride in Prisons says the group have been concerned about how trans prisoners are searched since they formed. “With the enormous volume of strip searches being made, less than 1% of which actually find contraband, we're concerned about the effect on trans prisoners,” she says. “Our position has always been that strip searches are sexual assault - being forced to strip naked, without the right to refuse, so a person you haven't consented to getting naked with can grope and inspect your body is rape, and none of us would tolerate it in our personal lives. Rākete says she has been told by one inmate that she was forcibly strip searched and after telling officers she didn’t want to be she was pinned down in her cell so it could be conducted. “The fact that, as we've heard from trans women inside, attempting to refuse means being held down and forcibly stripped naked really just drives that point home.” Emmy Rākete of No Pride in Prisons believes strip searches are sexual assault “We [NPIP] put in an Official Information Act request to find out how often officers have used force to make a prisoner let them strip them naked for a search but the Department has failed to centrally collect this data. It's a common loophole they've used to keep unflattering information from being subject to the Official Information Act - for months they used this same technique to deny our requests for the total number of transgender prisoners. When we look at these figures for finding of contraband, it's also important to note that OIA data No Pride In Prisons have received shows that around a third of 'contraband' is classified by the department as a weapon, two thirds is stuff like coffee, tattooing equipment, etc.” Rākete says she believes that the practice of strip searching goes far beyond an act of necessity. “Fundamentally, strip searches are rape and there is no justification for this practice in civil society. “People claim it would be impossible to run a prison without routinely forcing people to strip naked under threat of violence; we say this is not an argument in favour of strip searches but in favour of the abolition of prisons. Until the prison system is abolished, it's obvious that trans prisoners need to be strip searched by guards of their nominated gender. This is an important step in improving conditions for trans prisoners, but fundamentally it's just giving them a choice in who sexually assaults them. The only justifiable solution is the absolute, unqualified end of strip searches and prisons as a whole.” In information revealed as part of a OIA request by No Pride in Prisons Ti Lamusse in April, Corrections stated that it is “undertaking a comprehensive programme of work to help support transgender prisoners”, however the group is yet to find out exactly what this entails and a number of prominent members of the trans community including lawyer Kelly Ellis and academic Lexie Matheson have slammed the Department. “As for the Department's so-called programme of works for transgender prisoners, we've heard that it exists from Corrections staff, but an OIA request for information about it was turned down because they claimed telling us about what they were doing would prejudice their staff's ability to freely express opinions. “Given the complete cultural incompetence Corrections have displayed at every opportunity, it's our belief the programme is so ill-considered, shoddily constructed and offensively insensitive to the realities of queer life that they've recognised sharing it in its present state would make them look like the career bureaucrats with no experience in this field that they are.” “It's also important to note that it's now been six months since Auckland Pride, where Corrections staff were allowed to march representing that organisation, on the basis that this programme of work for LGBTI prisoners would be complete and meaningfully implemented by next Pride. “They've half run out the clock and the only meaningful change for queer prisoners has been the Prisoner Correspondence Project, coordinated entirely by members of the public.” Sarah Murphy - 2nd August 2016