NSW: Code-breakers examining jail gang phone calls: Woodham

AAP General News (Australia)
04-23-2007
NSW: Code-breakers examining jail gang phone calls: Woodham

SYDNEY, April 23 AAP - Translators and code-breakers are examining the phone conversations
of a group of Islamic inmates in Australia's highest security jail who are believed to
have formed a gang behind bars.

Twelve of the 37 inmates in the Super Max facility at NSW's Goulburn jail claim to
be practising Muslims, including a number of Aboriginal converts, raising security fears
among officials.

NSW Corrective Services commissioner Ron Woodham said the conversions, which began
innocently enough, now had authorities concerned that it was an organised operation masterminded
by convicted murderer Bassam Hamzy.

"In this case, these people have never had any contact or interest in religion before
and all of a sudden they're converting to Islam, and Hamzy is the powerbroker or the organiser,
as if he's forming a gang," Mr Woodham told Southern Cross Broadcasting today.

Mr Woodham said prisoners had received regular payments of about $100 which appeared
to be from family members.

But on closer inspection, the payments were revealed to have been organised by Hamzy
through his outside contacts.

"The officers are using a term down there now at Goulburn Jail: `Pay to pray'," Mr Woodham said.

"And, of course, that then puts the converts in a position where they're owing.

"He could call in favours and that can be quite dangerous to staff managing these real
dangerous people on a daily basis."

Mr Woodham said prison authorities had cracked down on Hamzy, transferring him to an
area where he was not in contact with other inmates, ensuring he only had non-contact
visits and must speak in English during visits and telephone calls.

"What we've found, even on the phone ... they're talking okay in English, then they
just use a few Arabic words," Mr Woodham said.

"That takes us a while to translate and when it translates it seems pretty innocent,
but it obviously means a lot more than what we know."

Mr Woodham said the phone calls had been taped and the conversations were being examined
by experts.

"We're taping it all," he said.

"After a while, we've got a library of tapes of their conversations, and those people
who can translate it and break codes are working on that."

Mr Woodham said Hamzy, who is serving 21 years for murder, was one of the worst criminals
he had come across.

He said he used the sort of rhetoric favoured by terrorist groups, and had put up photographs
of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden on his cell walls.

But he thought some of Hamzy's converts would abandon their new religion now that they
were out of contact with the ringleader.

"It's nothing to do with religion in their minds," he said.

"But they play the game, Hamzy's game."

AAP acb/was/maur/cdh

KEYWORD: GANGS

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