KEY POINTS:
Two patients of a high-security ward of Auckland's psychiatric hospital for offenders escaped from the facility within six months of each other.
One of the escapes by patients of the Rata unit, the most-secure ward for those with a mental illness, was from the grounds of the Mason Clinic in Mt Albert, in September 2006. The second was from within the Rata unit itself, in February last year.
Another patient from the Pohutukawa unit - high-security ward for those with intellectual disabilities - was "AWOL from escorted ground leave" in April last year.
A fourth patient went AWOL from the courtyard of the Kahikatea unit, a minimum-security ward, in November 2005.
The figures, covering escapes in the three years from 2005 to 2007, were obtained by the Herald from the Waitemata District Health Board under the Official Information Act.
This follows a Mason nurse being found guilty of professional misconduct on charges including supplying a patient with a cellphone, taking him to her home and ignoring an escape bid by another patient.
The board withheld the names of the escapers from the Mason Clinic. Clinic director Dr Sandy Simpson said yesterday that the number of escapes and absences-without-leave was low. None had resulted in harm to the public.
"We take careful steps to get people back in control of their lives and occasionally people breach those steps ...
"The Rata [escape] was a serious, sentinel event and was thoroughly reviewed."
It was the first and so far only escape from within the Rata unit and the review led to physical changes to prevent anyone using the same route.
Dr Simpson would not describe the changes, for security reasons.
The board papers also reveal that the patient "absconded from the unit while other clients and staff [were] involved in outside activity".
No staff were present on the ward at the time and the review found there was complacency about the degree of security offered by the unit's high-security environment.
In a separate case, a patient absconded while on unescorted leave and was "re-arrested three months later after alleged involvement in criminal offending".
Cannabis has been found on eight occasions in the last three years, including once in Rata. Staff were disciplined on 26 occasions from December 2005 until the end of last year.
This includes four dismissals for offences including sexual harassment, seeing a patient outside working hours and leaving a patient unattended at court.
