Army personnel put up barbed wire borders at Ardmore military correctional facility in preparation for its French prisoner, Dominique Prieur. Photo / NZ Herald Archive
Army personnel put up barbed wire borders at Ardmore military correctional facility in preparation for its French prisoner, Dominique Prieur. Photo / NZ Herald Archive
To celebrate Auckland’s 175th anniversary, its demisemiseptcentennial, the Weekend Herald continues its series celebrating the growth of the city with a look at people who shaped Auckland. The 30th anniversary of the Rainbow Warrior sinking is on July 10. Suzanne McFadden looks at the problems Auckland faced in containing its most renowned prisoners.
In association with
They remain Auckland's most infamous inmates. A couple whose incarceration in the city drew international attention; their custody caused authorities such anxiety, it led to a major operation to convert a military prison into a one-woman holding cell; and they were a constant source of intrigue over their communication by code and fears of jailbreak.
Auckland will probably never again play host to a couple of convicts like Alain and Sophie Turenge - the fake Swiss honeymooning couple who, in reality, were Major Alain Mafart and Captain Dominique Prieur.
The arrest of the French secret service agents for their involvement in the Rainbow Warrior bombing of July 1985 was the beginning of a fascinating period in New Zealand's penal history.
It's one thing to catch a spy: but how do you keep them safe from harm and secure? It was a conundrum which worried nearly all arms of the state's justice system.
After their arrests within days of the deadly explosion at Marsden Wharf, the couple were held in the men's and women's wings of Mt Eden Prison. They wrote letters to each other, apparently playing a game of chess by correspondence.
But Michael King's book, Death of the Rainbow Warrior, reveals police became concerned there was something more sinister to it.
"When police referred the [chess] moves to people experienced in the game, [the moves] were found to be illogical - they certainly did not represent the kind of tactics that would win games," King wrote.
Other letters contained phrases that just did not make sense, leading police to the conclusion that the letters were in fact cypher communication between the pair. It heightened fears they required more security than Mt Eden, and its collection of 1850s-era buildings, could offer.
The Rainbow Warrior lies on its side after the explosion. Photo / NZ Herald Archive
Already the government's external assessment group suspected plans by French security agencies to bust out Mafart and Prieur. There were even underground suggestions French South Pacific mercenaries were being offered thousands of dollars to help with an escape plan.
The agents were required to appear in court each week and, to transport them between the jail and the court, "Turenge Mobiles" - specially-reinforced police wagons - were built to further improve safety. Justice Ministry files released in 2001 revealed officials considered using armoured vans to move the pair but abandoned the idea when it was discovered they could be penetrated by .303 rifle. (The file did not say how this discovery was made).
Plans were changed when weekly court appearances were no longer required. Mafart was moved to the maximum security prison at Paremoremo where he was apparently a model prisoner. He would read sonnets of New Zealand poet James K Baxter and verses about exile by the French writer Victor Hugo.
He also played classical guitar and, allegedly, the bagpipes - though apparently it was too much for other inmates and stopped.
Alain Mafart
In all, though, Mafart seemed happy enough. During a 1991 debate in Parliament about Paremoremo, local MP and then deputy Prime Minister Don McKinnon told of an encounter with Mafart on a visit to the prison's notorious D block in 1985.
The agent apparently told the MP that he was being treated very well: "'They put me on the eastern side of D block in the morning, so I get the morning sun, and in the afternoon I go to the western side of D block, so I get the afternoon sun'," McKinnon recalled.
For Prieur, things were not so sunny. She had been flown to Christchurch Women's Prison and did not enjoy having to mix with inmates convicted of violent offences and, by one unconfirmed account in the French media, ended up in a fight with a drug-affected inmate.
Justice Ministry files show officials were wary of her even having access to a skipping rope. Eventually it was decided she could - but only if she returned the rope immediately.
The unhappiness at her situation - together with renewed fears that she might be sprung out of prison in the South Island - led to a remarkable plan to move her back to Auckland.
Officials decided the best place was the Ardmore military correctional facility, south of Auckland. It had been in use since World War II as an institution for wayward armed services personnel but was hastily converted for the French agent.
To host such a high security inmate, the site needed an upgrade. "More than 70 soldiers were put to work ringing the barracks with barbed wire and jumbo bins were placed along the driveway to force approaching vehicles to slow and follow a zig-zag route," wrote King, in Death of the Rainbow Warrior. "The result, in the words of a nearby resident, was to create a 'mini-Colditz'." Wire was even strung across the site's enclosed courtyard to deter a helicopter from landing.
Prieur was flown back to Auckland on September 18 by helicopter, landing in a paddock surrounded by the crack Special Air Service unit based at the nearby Papakura Camp. The lone captive spent some of her time knitting, though she was allowed a visit from her husband - her real one. Authorities still worried about French plans to rescue the agents, fears not helped by the alleged sighting of a French submarine close to Auckland. In his book, The Beat to the Beehive, former police inspector and MP Ross Meurant revealed the lengths to which plans went to guard Prieur.
Dominique Prieur
A planning document from the head of the Auckland Armed Offenders Squad, the late Inspector Ash Edwards, said two AOS members would be present 24 hours a day, backed up by the Army. "Intelligence suggests there is a real threat an outside agency may attempt to free the prisoner," Edwards said, according to the document reproduced in Meurant's book. If anything suspicious was noticed, not only would the entire AOS squad be scrambled but so would the Counter Terrorist Team from the SAS.
Meurant said he was briefed as the nightshift inspector whose job it would be to take charge if the French came ashore. "That night I really polished up my .38-Smith & Wesson revolver," he wrote.
Meanwhile justice officials were preparing for the preliminary court hearing. It was decided to use the old Supreme Court - the only building in central Auckland deemed suitable, with modifications. Security, including airport x-ray machines, was installed and space was made for the legions of journalists from around the world expected to be there.
Sensationally, when the defendants were brought before the court to face charges of murder, the Solicitor-General, Paul Neazor, QC, told Judge Ronald Gilbert that the accused had indicated they were prepared to plead guilty to manslaughter. The pleas were accepted and the pair were remanded in custody for sentence on November 22.
On that day, Sir Ronald Davison, the Chief Justice, sent the pair to jail for 10 years, saying they would not be given a short holiday and allowed to return home as heroes.
An AP news agency report at the time said Prieur was taken to a cell at Mt Eden, where deputy warden Russell Wood said: "It is politic to leave a lady on her own for the first weekend after she has been given a long sentence. If tears are appropriate, she can shed them into her own pillow."
Mafart was returned to Paremoremo, where superintendent Les Hine said: "I can appreciate that his need is the same as any person who gets a 10-year sentence and has not been imprisoned before."
A French radio journalist who managed to get through by phone to Prieur after sentencing, reported her as saying she was not a "terrorist" but "a captain in the French army who did what she was told to do". The sentences were "what we expected, a little tough perhaps".
As it turned out, not so tough. Within weeks, French politicians were attempting to shower the agents with gifts of cognac and Bordeaux wine, Justice Ministry files later revealed. The gifts, though, were rejected by prison authorities, as explained in a cable to Paris. "Alcoholic beverages are under no circumstances allowed into New Zealand prisons," said the cable. "Our authorities could not permit an exception in a matter so sensitive in New Zealand."
But such indifference to French efforts was not to trouble the pair for much longer. They were transferred to a French military facility on Hao Atoll in July 1986 to complete their sentences; both were back in France within two years of that.
