String of security issues found a year before teen killer's escape from custody

Monday, 21 September 2020

Haami Hanara was 14 years old when he killed Kelly Donner in 2018.

A string of security failings were flagged at a youth justice facility following a three-day-long escape, a year before a teen killer broke out and went on the run.

Haami Hanara, 16, and a 17-year-old boy removed a reinforced window, clambered across a roof and fled through a car park at the Oranga Tamariki-run Korowai Manaaki facility, in south Auckland, on July 4, 2020.

A year earlier, problems with windows, an anti-climb barrier and CCTV blind spots were discovered at the centre, which is one of four that houses some of the country’s most high-risk and at-risk young people.

Two escapes from south Auckland’s Korowai Manaaki facility revealed issues with CCTV coverage (file photo).

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Oranga Tamariki data, released under the Official Information Act, also revealed there were eight other escapes over a five-year period across three of the agency’s four youth justice facilities, involving 25 young people.

Staff realised the pair were missing about an hour and 20 minutes after they escaped.

But it was a further 40 minutes, after an unsuccessful search of the perimeter, before police were called.

Children’s commissioner Judge Andrew Becroft wants to see the use of youth justice facilities reduced and “most of them” phased out.

Five days later, Hanara was sighted by officers in the Wiri area and was taken into custody following a “short foot pursuit”.

Thirteen days after escaping, the other boy was found at an address in Manurewa.

Neither had escaped a youth justice facility previously.

Ben Hannifin, the agency’s general manager youth justice services told Stuff it had spent “considerable” time understanding how the pair had escaped.

“Our focus now is on improving our systems so this is less likely to happen again.”

Oranga Tamariki runs four youth justice facilities across the country in Auckland, Rotorua, Palmerston North and Christchurch.

The escape was the third from Korowai Manaaki, which can house up to 40 youths, in less than 18 months.

In March 2019, a bedroom window was removed during an almost identical break-out from the apparently secure facility.

A 16-year-old boy absconded through the staff car park and was on the run for three days.

There was “no aggression or noise” prior to his escape and no one was injured.

Following that incident, Oranga Tamariki thought it had blocked that method of escape – contractors had reinforced windows and frames.

Haami Hanara’s July 2020 escape was the third from Korowai Manaaki in 18 months.

Emails between Allan Boreham, the agency’s deputy chief executive youth justice services, Hannifin, and health, safety and security lead Kenny O’Brien, identified three “issues” which contributed to the March 12, 2019 escape.

The first was a known weakness in the way the windows were installed being exploited.

There was a recommendation to have the weakness fixed by re-installing the windows to the same standard seen at its Rotorua facility, but the project team decided to adopt an alternative, untested design.

The second issue was damage to an anti-climb security barrier, with a temporary fix leaving a climb point fully accessible.

O’Brien noted the damage occurred several months before but hadn’t been fixed.

The final issue was with CCTV coverage. Several cameras were not angled appropriately, there were a number of “critical areas” with little to no coverage and several of the perimeter fences did not have cameras.

Bedrooms in youth justice facilities are small and confined, are locked from the outside and appear prison-like. (File photo)

Hannifin said the issues were “fixed immediately” after the escape.

An investigation into a second escape at Korowai Manaaki on December 28, 2019, in which four youths were on the run for up to two days, found further issues with CCTV.

It said the escape would likely not have occurred if the operator of the CCTV/control room was “adequately trained”.

The investigation concluded the same for an escape at Te Maioha o Parekarangi on January 4, 2020, where six youths, aged between 15 and 17, fled.

The day of the escape coincided with a staff member’s tangi and a number of workers attended.

Children’s commissioner Andrew Becroft said 80 per cent of those in youth justice facilities were on remand.

One youth, 15, was caught 12 days later.

The escapes prompted Hannifin to instruct January CCTV/control rooms to be monitored 24/7 by trained staff.

Te Maioha o Parekangi recorded four other escapes in the past five years, Korawai Manaaki one, and Palmerston North’s Te Au rere a te Tonga one, the data showed.

There had also been two incidents where youths had made it outside but were detained and returned to custody – one from Korawai Manaaki in 2015 and one from Te Au rere in 2020.

Hannifin said although hundreds of teenagers spend time at its youth facilities every year, escapes were rare.

Some of the most high-risk and at-risk youth in the country who are at various stages of going through the Youth Court are housed in youth justice facilities. (File photo)

Children’s commissioner Andrew Becroft said although escapes were “concerning”, they were not sophisticatedly planned – rather, young people exploiting system failures and bad design.

“The public can have confidence that although they’re not 100 escape proof they are built to be prison-like and not to be walk in walk outs, it’s not their character.”

However, there are some who feel youth justice facilities are not the right place for young people.

Tania Sawicki Mead, the director of JustSpeak, said the state’s reliance on such facilities was “outdated”.

“The environment can be for many quite scary, uncertain and quite harmful.”

She said the vast majority in youth justice facilities were on remand and had not been sentenced yet.

Before 17-year-olds were included in the youth justice system from July last year, a report noted about 80 per cent of the 140 young people in secure youth justice residences were on remand.

Of those, a disproportionate number, at least 70 per cent, were Māori.

Mead said the state needed to start thinking about alternative environments for those in youth justice facilities and put emphasis on keeping young people out of them.

“We need to think creatively and in the long term about what the best solutions for young people are.”

She felt there needed to be greater investment in community-led initiatives and kaupapa Māori services.

This included community remand homes, which Mead felt were the way of the future, as there would be people in the community who know the young people, what their needs are and how to support them – “Not with high fences, locked doors and gates,” she said.

One State of Care report by Becroft made similar conclusions, noting there needed to be a shift away from placing young people in large, secure residences, which were old-fashioned.

He told Stuff he would like to see the use of the “prison-like” facilities reduced and the closure of “most of them” phased, but said staff were doing their “conscientious best” in the confines of the current model.

“It’s time to accept for most young people the model is flawed and so last century.”

Becroft noted in the 2018 report community group homes offered an important alternative to institutional residential care and was encouraged to see Oranga Tamariki had started to increase investment in this option.

He told Stuff Ngāpuhi’s Mahuru service was a “groundbreaking” example of a community remand home which did not compromise security or rehabilitation in its approach to youth justice.

Becroft said partnering with Māori, or by Māori for Māori approaches, were the way forward.