A view from a living hell

Emergency maintenance personnel came into Katingal at midnight but were unable to repair the system. Electric fans were issued to circulate air until the system was repaired. Temporary repairs lasted until January 3, 1978 when the second major breakdown occurred and cut off air supply to every cell block. For three days during that summer of 1978 we lived in an airless sauna. It happened again May 3, 1978 but Katingal exploded the next day for a different reason.

Barrie Levy broke his ankle and lay in agony inside the airless cellblock. Prison medical staff refused to treat him. They had walked off the job in sympathy with striking Long Bay prison warders. Katingal erupted. It was a riot with a single demand - immediate medical attention for Levy.

We barricaded ourselves in the cell blocks and smashed everything that was smashable. Years of frustration and tension spewed out of the cell blocks like a tidal wave. Once our anger was spent we prepared for the inevitable retaliatory onslaught. Prison guards and the NSW Special Weapons and Tactical Response Group had already surrounded Katingal and cordoned off the building.

After 36 hours the insurrection ended peacefully when Levy was transferred to Prince Henry Hospital. X-rays showed his leg and ankle broken in three places and he underwent immediate surgery.

The riot resulted with another unexpected surprise. “Lantern Jaw” was replaced as superintendent effective from 5pm that day. Deputy Craig became acting superintendent in the wake of his transfer and a relative calm was restored to the building.

Katingal’s fate was finally sealed on May 31, 1978.

It was 3am when Jimmy “The Irishman” Murray knocked on my cell wall and whispered under the door, “They’re here!”

I looked out my Judas window and saw the cascade of sparks showering into the exercise yard. Two shadowy figures had scaled the perimeter fences and hauled oxyacetylene equipment onto Katingal’s roof. As the oxy sliced through the caged canopy over the exercise yard everyone in Yellow and Green cellblocks watched with adrenalin pumping anticipation. Freedom was only minutes away.

As the security doors into the cell blocks were being attacked a noise alerted the night watch screw and he walked onto the gallery. He spotted the shower of sparks from oxyacetylene torches and raised the alarm. The mass escape from Katingal had been thwarted. I went back to bed and waited for the repercussions that would eventuate.

The break-in finally forced the NSW Government to close Katingal. The Pavlovian experiment in behaviour modification and sensory deprivation ended on June 3, 1978. I felt the exhilaration of an astronaut’s orbital re-entry as the early morning security convoys transferred us to new homes at Parramatta and Maitland jails. For two years and eight months I had been on another planet inside the NSW prison system. I finally saw daylight again.

Despite its 1978 closure Katingal continued to create controversy.

In 1993 the former NSW Commissioner for Corrective Services, Dr Tony Vinson, was required to give evidence at the trial of Russell Cox concerning his 1977 escape. Dr Vinson’s testimony provided a crucial link to the startling revelation that Katingal Special Security Unit had never officially existed.