Police arrested 13 people in Victoria on Thursday over a riot at a maximum security prison in June the day before a smoking ban was to be introduced in the state’s jails.
Prisoners at Ravenhall remand centre tore apart bedding and facilities in their cells, armed themselves with sticks and bashed in doors, and lit fires as they roamed the grounds after breaking through an inside fence.
Police armed with teargas and water cannons were brought in to contain the prisoners, who rioted into the night and caused an estimated $10m damage. The prison was placed in lockdown, and prisoners have had cuts to visitor hours and recreation time while repairs were carried out.
Taskforce Gallium was formed to investigate the riot and identify the inmates involved. This culminated in arrests throughout the state on Thursday, beginning at 4am.
A number of prisoners who are still in the prison have also been charged and will appear in court in January.
“This morning’s arrests are the culmination of a lengthy, thorough and comprehensive investigation by a dedicated team of detectives,” police said.
“Detectives have taken more than 300 witness statements from both prisoners and Corrections Victoria employees and identified more than 100 inmates who played a role in the incident.”
Assistant commissioner of Victoria police, Stephen Fontana, said up to 100 offenders would be charged in total.
“The charges are serious,” he said. “There will be a whole range of offenders that will be charged with sabotage, some with attempted sabotage, they’ll all get charged with riot as well. As we know, extensive damage was done to the prison.”
He said the damage bill had been updated to $25m. There were a large core group of about 40 prisoners responsible for the protest, though about 100 were involved in causing damage, he said.
“We’ve done a lot of work to identify those responsible for the extensive damage at the prison,” he said. “There was a lot of a damage done right across the prison system and it put it offline for quite some time.”
