Guard took drugs to prisoner

Pulete. Photo / Dean Purcell

A prison guard has admitted bringing drugs wrapped in plastic tape and a cellphone to a gang leader who once led an international P-importing syndicate from his jail cell.

Alan Na'a, 30, pleaded guilty in the Auckland District Court on Friday to six charges of bringing items into the prison between January 2009 and February this year.

He will be sentenced on October 1.

Four of the charges relate to Na'a bringing in parcels wrapped in plastic, believed to have been controlled drugs, to remand prisoners Ulaiasi Pulete and Jinshan Chen.

He was also charged with bringing Chen a Chinese takeaway meal wrapped in plastic tape, also believed to have contained controlled drugs; and a mobile phone for Pulete - the head of the of the King Cobras gang.

It is understood the gang paid Na'a $1000 to take the phone to Pulete.

Pulete was sentenced to 14 years behind bars in 2001 after he and other inmates were caught running a P ring from their cells. The group used mobile phones to organise the importation of nearly $1 million worth of narcotics.

Pulete was on remand in Mt Eden Prison when he devised the drug-trafficking plan.

Na'a was arrested after a joint operation between Corrections and police.