Sensational prison scandal

shocks New Caledonia

From Fred Dunn in Noumea A sensational prison scandal, with lurid details emerging nearly every day, kept New Caledonians agog and horrified throughout most of January.

IHE scandal involved the head warder and six of his assistants Noumea’s Nouville Prison, They i alleged to have brutally assaulted •ee prisoners after they escaped un the prison and were recaptured New Year’s Eve.

One of the prisoners, Marx sapin, 25, was so badly injured it a special plane was chartered fly him to Australia for medical atment. However, he died on the y and the plane returned to mmea.

When his body was laid out in i city morgue, hundreds of people sued to see it; and when his funeral s held next day, the cortege was If a mile long, despite pouring rain.

Meanwhile, the head warder, Henri mmelet, and his six assistants had ;n arrested and imprisoned, pend ! the laying of charges against m; and the administration of ►uville Prison was placed in the ads of the gendarmerie. Later, a a-man commission was appointed the government to investigate the ndal and conditions at Nouville lerally, Nouville Prison is on He Nou, a ge island which nearly landlocks iumea Harbour. The island is -orious in the annals of New ledonia, for it was there that ne 40,000 convicts, transported m France, were incarcerated in second half of last century

Recognised by shopkeeper

Arsapin and the two other prison involved in the assault case aped from the prison on Christ -5 Eve Phey were at large for nearly a ek, being recaptured 15 miles m Noumea after a shopkeeper ognised them and tipped off the idarmerie when they went into his re to buy food.

Hie three men had left a trail of )bed houses and stores behind m. Their intention had been to ich the Bay of Prony, get aboard nickel ship bound for Australia, 1 go from there to Thailand.

Arsapin’s companions had been serving short sentences at Nouville for stealing dynamite, car stealing and assault and battery. Arsapin, himself, was awaiting trial on a charge of having fired a shot at a Tahitian, who had thrashed him after finding him in bed with his wife.

The three escapees were returned to Nouville on New Year’s Eve. Pom melet and the other warders are alleged to have assaulted them three times that same night.

Bloodstained

Next morning, Pommelet gave some bloodstained clothing and a bloodstained blanket to a “trusty” prisoner and ordered him to burn it.

However, the trusty, having an errand in Noumea, took the blood stained articles to the Procureur- General, the highest judicial authority in New Caledonia, and told him what he knew of the assaults.

Meanwhile, a prison doctor from the mainland arrived at Nouville to make his daily visit, but Pommelet told him there was no case needing his attention.

Subsequently, the doctor was asked by the Procureur-General’s office to go back to Nouville to in vestigate the “trusty’s” story, and this led to the the three prisoners being hospitalised and to the arrest of Pommelet and his assistants.

The warders, ironically, were placed in the cells formerly occupied by the assaulted men while a juge d’instruction (magistrate) made a further investigation before laying charges against them.

Appalled

The doctors called to treat the injured prisoners were reported to be appalled by the extent of their injuries. Arsapin had apparently suffered critical damage to the kidneys; one of the other men had severe spinal injuries; and the third had three broken ribs.

By January 5, Arsapin was so ill that the authorities decided to fly him to Sydney for emergency treat ment.

He was placed aboard a French Navy DC-4 aircraft next day with a high-ranking doctor and a relative.

However, the plane had only gone about a third of the way when the doctor announced that Arsapin was dead. The plane then returned to Noumea.

News of Arsapin’s death caused a wave of public indignation in Noumea; and there was a sensational turn on the day of his funeral when a young French conscript, Francis Holzman, went to the juge d’instruc tion and asked to give evidence.

Holzman, it turned out, had been in Nouville Prison for some weeks

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»r a minor offence, and was in the >ll next to Arsapin at the time of ic assault.

He had seen part of the assault id had “heard it all”, and had lain . fear all night that the same thing ould be inflicted on him.

Holzman had been released from ison the morning after the assault id was due to be repatriated to ranee. However, the authorities iund his evidence so interesting that iey asked him remain in Noumea.

Following Holzman’s disclosures to ie authorities, a spate of lurid Dries appeared in the Press, giving ‘tails of the assaults. Some of these jparently emanated from Holzman.

It was stated, for example, that Dmmelet and the other warders ere drunk at the time of the assaults; at Arsapin’s hands were tied behind s back at one stage; and that Pom elet’s son had held an electric rch so that the assailants could see :tter to carry out their work.

On January 9, Noumea’s daily ranee Australe published a sensa >nal interview with Arsapin’s father, ho works at the mining centre of hio.

The father said that when he first saw his son on January 4, he was unconscious and his body shook intermittently with terrible spasms.

From time to time, his son regained consciousness, during which he told of his sufferings.

Spattered with blood

The son said that the warders had beaten him nearly all night and that he knew that they had done for him. Fie said that the walls of his cell were spattered with blood to a height of two feet.

The father declared that he had laid charges (not specified) with the Procureur-General and had retained a lawyer to defend his interests.

He said that at Nouville, Pommelet had been an all-powerful, untouch able king and that none had dared to speak against him. He added that some time before the assault, his son had complained to his sisters that he received only one good meal every three days and that, in between, he had to subsist on bread and water.

Other newspaper articles clamoured for an inquiry into the conduct of

New Caledonia’s prisons, and called for the head of the chief administ rator of the prison department (a high-ranking public servant from France).

The newspapers reproached him for lack of interest in and knowledge of his department, and claimed that he apparently did not know (as every one else did) that Pommelet and the other warders were frequently drunk, that prisoners were sometimes beaten, that life at the prison was more like that of infamous He Nou last century than a modern prison should be, that no effort was made to provide proper amenities for the inmates, and that men awaiting trial were thrown into the company of hardened con victs, etc., etc.

The commission of inquiry that was eventually appointed by the government to investigate the scandal consists of two members of the government council Mr. Arnold Daly, a European lawyer, and Mr.

Theophile Wakolo Puye, a Mela nesian. They have also been asked to recommend any desirable changes in the administration of the prison.

The commissioners are expected to take about a month to complete their inquiry and make their report. New Caledonians are awaiting the report with great interest.