"So if they're complying with you and they need help like a lawyer or something you just go off and do it."
He says the job requires security guards to calm a person down before resorting to restraint.
"You stand in a packed foyer, you pick up on behaviours and nip it before it gets to boiling point.
"You're not to be a thug, you've got to be professional with the uniform."
And he says that respect pays off. Mr Hurlimann said he has built a working relationship over the years with some of the court regulars.
"In the last 10 years I've seen two generations of the same families come in here. I see them walking down the street out of uniform and there's no malice, they know you've got a job to do."
When he joined, the department of justice was in the process of expanding the number of court security officers. At that time the number of fulltime court security staff was small. The role was handled mainly by police with corrections and private firms handling any staff shortages.
"I just don't think they had enough police to babysit everyone at the courts to make sure they behaved."
He says fulltime court security numbers have expanded since then and the Whanganui Court House is a much safer place.
"Back then there was more tension between the gangs. Whichever gang got to the top floor first had the higher ground, and pretty much there were fights here daily. It's just what courts were like."
His manager, Peter Te Huna, is the court team security manager for the Whanganui region.
He echoes Mr Hurlimann's recollections.
He began in 2004 and the top foyer of the court house was divided up into gang territory.
"Where our office is now upstairs, the Mongrel Mob owned it, so they reckoned. The interview room was owned by the Black Power. Hells Angels and the skinheads owned the kiosk."
He says back then the gangs knew the numbered access codes to some of the rooms within the courthouse.
"So the Black Power would stay in that interview room. But if the Mongrel Mob got here first, just to p**s Black Power off they would go and sit in that room. We had things like one gang member would drive around the court, with those big army phones. They'd keep watch and say 'Black Power have arrived, four cars'. Before Robert started Whanganui was considered one of the top 10 high-risk courthouses in New Zealand."
He says it was "friends in high places" that pushed for the increase in staff numbers.
"We had the support of all the judges, who said 'We're not sitting unless we have security in the courtroom'."
An attack on a judge elsewhere in New Zealand, during a discussion with a man suffering mental ill health, helped change the system. "Our roles then started to go up, we're now required to attend every mental health meeting," he says.
There are 132 court security officers nationwide, up from 54 in November 2008.
