Violent offender escapes from toilet visit
How did a violent offender handcuffed to a rail inside a toilet take flight and remain on the run for nearly three months? Sam Sherwood reports.
Handcuffed to a handrail inside a toilet at Hutt Hospital, Uditha Punchihewa launched his brazen escape.
The violent inmate, who was in hospital for medical treatment, was able to remove his handcuffs and a GPS bracelet from his ankle and exit into the corridor.
Once outside he came face-toface with one of two guards meant to be watching him. The guard yelled ‘‘how did you get out of there?’’ and grabbed him, but Punchihewa was able to push him off and fled the hospital wearing only his gown.
Nearly three months later he was found. The 32-year-old was sentenced in December to two years and three months years’ prison for a variety of charges including kidnapping and escaping lawful custody. His explanation for the escape was that he woke up in a hospital thinking his organs were about to be harvested and fled to protect his life.
A review into Punchihewa’s escape, obtained by the Sunday Star-Times under the Official Information Act, found staff did not follow the correct process for handcuffing a prisoner and the interchanging of handcuffs during staff handovers.
The review had 11 recommendations including developing a national standard for staff completing escorts and or hospital guards to follow, and for any prisoner departing the site for medical escort and or hospital admission to have inserts applied with the high-security cuffs.
Punchihewa, who at the time was on remand at Rimutaka Prison awaiting trial, was taken to Hutt Hospital on October 11, 2019, after he was allegedly assaulted by another prisoner.
Before Punchihewa was transferred, the prison staff were briefed by the Acting Principal Corrections Officer who said they were to always remain handcuffed to him.
About 2pm the following day there was a handover of escorting staff from a Corrections officer to the oncoming shift of escorting staff – a Corrections officer and a casual hospital guard in Punchihewa’s room on level four.
A copy of the statements to police from the two staff members left looking after Punchihewa was released to the Star-Times as part of the review.
One of the staffers, a casual hospital guard for Corrections, said from the moment he and his colleague, a Corrections officer, had custody of Punchihewa, he was ‘‘agitated and acting very unusually’’.
About 3pm Punchihewa indicated he wanted to go to the toilet. The guard took him to the cubicle where he urinated, and washed his hands, before going back to bed.
At 3.45pm he said he needed the toilet again. At the same time the Corrections officer was on the phone to Rimutaka Prison.
The hospital guard took Punchihewa into the cubicle thinking he wanted to urinate again, however when they entered he indicated he wanted to sit down.
The Corrections officer, who was still on the phone, entered the cubicle as the hospital guard undid the cuff that was on him and attached it securely to the disabled rail next to the toilet.
He then left the cubicle and stood in the corridor covering the cubicle door and the whole corridor in case he went out the door.
The cubicle was in between two rooms, both of which only exited into the corridor. The guard said he was about two metres from the cubicle door.
Punchihewa had been in the toilet ‘‘a little while’’, when the guard checked he was OK. He replied, ‘‘I am all good’’.
Moments later he appeared on his side in the hallway of the hospital with his right hand on the back of his head.
‘‘It was apparent that he had no cuffs on and was shocked to see me standing there. He was only about a metre away and approaching me saying ‘I don’t know what’s happening’. I responded in the loudest voice I could muster ‘How did you get out of there?’, repeating it again.’’
The guard grabbed him with both hands on his upper arms, but Punchihewa pushed him off and ran down the corridor. The guard’s colleague then appeared and they chased him down the corridor.
The second guard continued to pursue Punchihewa while the first guard went back to the room and called the police. When he went back into the cubicle to investigate, the cuffs were still attached to the rail. The tracker from his ankle had been removed and was on the floor.
In her statement to police, the Corrections officer said Punchihewa, wearing a hospital issue gown and pyjama bottoms, ran down the stairs. She could not see him, but could hear him.
Three young men helped look for him, but lost track of him after they got off level four. She then went back to the room to wait for the police.
The Corrections officer, who had about 16 years’ experience, was not able to be interviewed when the operational review commenced. Punchihewa was also not available.
The hospital guard said he was recruited in 2015 and received a ‘‘very basic training package’’ and had not received any yearly freshers, updates of policy, procedural changes, and equipment changes from ratchet handcuffs to the high-security cuffs.
The review concluded staff did not follow the correct process for handcuffing a prisoner and the interchanging of handcuffs during staff handovers. It was unclear if inserts were used with high-security cuffs prior to departure, and whether they were available in the hospital escort pack. They also did not phone for permission to remove the handcuffs as per escorting instructions.
It also found there was no scheduled refresher training for any casual hospital guard.
Corrections National Commissioner Rachel Leota said an investment in prison infrastructure and strengthened custodial management had seen a reduction in the number of escapes. There had been no break-out escapes from New Zealand prisons since 2014.
Custodial staff completed more than 14,000 medical escorts during 2019/20.
‘‘We are focused on increasing the delivery of health services for planned and unplanned care through the use of information and communication technologies (telehealth services). This will result in fewer people being transferred out of prison to receive the care they need, thereby reducing a person’s opportunity to escape.’’
Corrections were also working to improve health centre ‘‘decision-making processes’’, which determined when people were transferred to an external health provider for acute or planned care. ‘‘This is to ensure that all medical escorts are clinically appropriate and any safety issues or risk of escape, which may affect the timing of a medical escort, have been considered with custodial staff.’’
‘‘I responded in the loudest voice I could muster ‘How did you get out of there?’, repeating it again.’’ Hospital guard