Claim of more prison photos on Facebook
The victim of Corey Thompson, who updated his Facebook account with photos from jail, says she has received an apology from the prison director, but it’s not enough.
Maude Heath, whose gallery was burgled by Thompson, said Rimutaka Prison director Chris Burns had apologised, but was powerless to remove photos taken inside prison walls.
Since the publication of Thompson’s jail selfies, has been alerted to a similar case of photos posted from inside the jail.
A woman who did not want to be named said she was horrified when her brother’s killer posted photos on his Facebook account from jail.
She alerted the Corrections Department in September, but the photos were not removed for five weeks, she said. The photos showed men in Rimutaka Prison clothing posing in their cells.
‘‘It’s disgusting how dangerous some of these people are, and the risk this imposes on the public them having cellphones and access to Facebook,’’ she said.
’’I even had the Corrections Department have the nerve to say to me, ‘it could be someone doing this outside of prison and that this pic is not of him in prison’ . . . when you can clearly see he is in his prison cell in the background.’’
Burns would not comment on the woman’s claims but, in a written statement, said the department was dependent on Facebook to remove the photos.
It was illegal for prisoners to have cellphones, but they could ask family members to post to social media sites, he said.
Thompson pleaded guilty in September to stealing $16,000 worth of pounamu in the February burglary of Artel Gallery, in Waikanae. – Fairfax NZ