A 3 News investigation has revealed a female guard who had an inappropriate relationship with an inmate is just one of more than a dozen workers sacked from the Serco-run Mt Eden jail in the past 12 months.
The former guard's career was short-lived after she was sacked for getting personal with a gang member and inmate under her watch. He remains in prison, but they are still friends on Facebook.
The former guard told 3 News she was caught after other officers suspected a relationship and there was "video footage of me going into the unit and staying in there for a while".
The footage also showed the inmate going into the unit and them staying there for up to an hour at a time, out of view of CCTV cameras.
She denies the relationship was ever physical, and told 3 News, "He never asked me to do anything for him, bring anything in, nothing like that."
The inmate has since been sentenced to four years and seven months' jail for his part in the 2013 riot and arson at Spring Hill prison; he beat one prison officer with a plank of wood, and punched and maced another.
But the sacked Serco guard says she's "not one to judge on what someone's done in their past".
The female guard was fired by Serco in March this year following an investigation, but she isn't the only one to have lost their job at the privately run jail. In the past 12 months, 16 workers there been sacked for disciplinary reasons.
"That is an incredibly high number and Corrections should be scared and worried by that figure," says Corrections Association president Bevan Hanlon.
Another guard's contract was terminated as the result of an ongoing police investigation into an alleged methamphetamine ring.
In July, several properties associated with the Head Hunters gang were raided and luxury and classic cars seized.
Three prisoners at the Serco-run Mt Eden jail have been charged and police have revealed a Serco guard is still under investigation for allegedly supplying contraband including cellphone to Head Hunters behind bars.
3 News has tracked him down too.
"I never see anything. I can't help you," he says.
3 News understands the guard was searched after being seen on CCTV in the prison carpark, where he allegedly picked up a package containing contraband and took it through at least one security check before he was met by a sniffer dog.
"I have got nothing to say, I have got no comment to make," he says.
Serco wouldn't appear on camera, but says it takes a strong stand on any breaches of professional standards or its code of conduct and it reports all disciplinary cases to Corrections.
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