“What you have done is sad,” the judge said to a 24-year-old woman from the Frisian municipality of Achtkarspelen. At the end of September 2022, De Friezin leaked secret information to a prisoner as a guard in the prison in Veenhuizen. The judge imposed a community service order of 70 hours on her.
The woman was in love with the man she was secretly chatting with. She knew he used a phone smuggled into the prison to do this.
In the messages, she said she knew how detainees manipulated urine tests to influence the test result. She also texted about austerity measures within prisons, which resulted in fewer controls.
“These are things that the prisoners are not allowed to know. Security within the prison is jeopardized in this way and you run the risk of being blackmailed with your leaked information. You have made serious mistakes,” the judge said. The woman knew about the confidentiality obligation and knew the codes of conduct. She was sworn in to do this in 2021, when she started her job.
Suspicions arose, but an internal investigation turned up nothing. The woman was able to return to work after a short break. An unexpected cell inspection on September 29, 2022 brought the matter to light. The prisoner was caught red-handed with the banned mobile phone in his hand. The device was seized and examined. The woman was in trouble from that moment on.
She no longer received replies to her messages and knew that the device had possibly been discovered. She was confronted with her secret contacts. She strongly denied it. Until she was confronted with the messages. She admitted that she had deeper feelings for the man. One day at the airport he had pressed a piece of paper into her hand with his telephone number on it.
She was the first to make contact. And that was the beginning of a secret love within the prison walls. The man was transferred to Arnhem, she was summarily dismissed at the beginning of 2023. The woman cried in front of the judge. She was deeply ashamed. She knew that as a correctional worker (PIW), she should have reported the cell phone and the prisoner’s drug use.
She hadn’t sought help when the feelings of love arose. In fact, she lied about it when it was about to come to light. In addition to 70 hours of community service, the public prosecutor also demanded a suspended prison sentence of two weeks. “What you have done is not nothing. I understand from your attitude that you have understood the message,” said the judge and only limited it to community service.
