I Smuggled In Phones Under Duress, Prison Officer Says
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday August 15, 2003
A prison officer who was paid $8000 to smuggle contraband including mobile phones into the country's most secure jail said yesterday he did so out of fear of a powerful prisoner.
Cale David Urosevic , 26, told the Independent Commission Against Corruption he was not motivated by financial gain but felt threatened, harassed and intimidated by an inmate in Goulburn's Super Max.
Mr Urosevic said he was first approached about bringing mobiles into the prison last September by an inmate given the pseudonym C1.
He began to feel threatened as C1 slipped notes under his cell door. In one note, he warned: ``Don't f--- me around. A deal's a deal."
C1 wrote contact details for a person called ``G", whom Mr Urosevic arranged to meet in Canberra in February. Mr Urosevic said he met G and another man, whom he described as ``big burly blokes" and ``hired goons" to explain their plan was too dangerous.
But they gave him two phones, a charger, a quantity of steroids and $4000. ``They said, `Listen, a deal's a deal. Just take the stuff and shut up'."
At a second meeting Mr Urosevic was given two more phones and a small ratchet device to be used by C1 to remove the cover of his cell's light unit to hide the contraband.
On March 14 prison guards searched the cell and found the goods. On June 28 Mr Urosevic was approached at the jail's boom gates by a man who had regularly visited C1.
During a conversation recorded by ICAC, Mr Urosevic told the man he might still be able to smuggle in ``just the organic stuff" but ``nothing electrical".
Mr Urosevic was later paid $4000 to smuggle in 10 steroid tablets. He was arrested by ICAC officers and police on the Federal Highway.
Mr Urosevic is likely to face criminal charges.
© 2003 Sydney Morning Herald
