KEY POINTS:
People do not go to prison to be punished as they have already been punished enough by losing their liberty, a top Department of Corrections official has claimed.
The comment, which astonished National Party Corrections spokesman Simon Power, came as part of a Department of Corrections explanation of
the security arrangements of stabbed triple RSA killer William Bell.
Bell has the top security-risk classification and guards were aware he might try to escape, but he was still allowed frequent visits with his family because "people don't go to prison to be punished".
The Herald reported this week how the maximum security inmate had upset fellow prisoners by bragging about his crime and saying he was getting "preferential treatment" that included more face-to-face contact visits than other inmates.
Corrections assistant general manager operations Bryan McMurray said staff had received information that Bell was going to try to escape and was therefore classified as having the highest security risk rating available.
Despite that, he was still allowed supervised contact visits every two months, as well as the half-hour weekly non-contact visits all prisoners are entitled to.
Mr McMurray said Bell was not getting special treatment, just what he was entitled to and what had been approved under his sentencing plan.
When asked why an inmate with the top security-risk rating was allowed extra family visits, Mr McMurray said the visits took place in a secure location and Bell wasn't in prison to be punished.
"I think you are getting confused about why he's in prison.
"The reason he has come to prison is that's the punishment - it's sending him to prison.
"He doesn't go to prison to get punishment, he's taken out of the community, that's the punishment the court has given him."
Responding to concerns that prisoners like Bell had an easy time in prison, Mr McMurray said being locked up every day from 5pm to 8am was "definitely a restriction" on a person's liberty.
Mr Power said he was astonished by Mr McMurray's comments, which reinforced just how out of touch Corrections was.
"People do go to prison to be punished. They also go there to have some of the offending issues dealt with, but primarily society would form the view that prison is there for punitive reasons."
Sensible Sentencing Trust spokesman Garth McVicar said Mr McMurray was right - prison wasn't a place where inmates were punished these days and that was a fundamental flaw that needed changing.
"People like William Bell, in our opinion, should be breaking rocks and that's what the public expect."
Corrections Minister Phil Goff denied Bell was getting preferential treatment, saying the inmates in Paremoremo's maximum security unit were "usually scumbags" and should be treated with scepticism.