SENIOR staff at Brook House detention centre “were aware that staff were smuggling drugs” into the facility, a former custody officer has claimed. 

Giving evidence to the ongoing inquiry into alleged mistreatment of detainees at the facility, Shayne Munroe said that when she worked at Brook House, detainees told her that staff were bringing in smart phones, money and the drugs cannabis and spice.

Custody managers and senior management likely knew this was happening, but didn’t act to prevent it, she claimed. 

Asked why she had this impression, Ms Munroe replied: “Because drugs were a constant problem. They couldn’t just be coming in through visits and the post. They had to be coming from somewhere else. 

“It didn’t appear like much was being done to fix the problem so I felt like they were all just allowing it to happen really.”

Ms Munroe said she was only searched once during the one-and-a-half years she worked as a custody officer at Brook House between 2016 and 2017, having been told before starting her job that staff would regularly face random checks.

Despite the widespread use of spice among detainees at Brook House, Ms Munroe said managers did not increase the number of staff checks.

The former custody officer said she felt senior staff were “allowing this to happen because they don’t care.”

She said: “There are no consequences for anything happening in that place.”

However, Ms Munroe said she didn’t personally witness staff smuggling in drugs.

The inquiry heard earlier from a Somalian detainee who claimed that parcels of contraband would be prepared outside and brought in by custody officers working for G4S, which ran Brook House at the time. 

The public inquiry was launched to investigate alleged abuse of detainees at Brook House uncovered by BBC Panorama in 2017. The programme showed detainees being physically and verbally abused by staff, including with racist language. 

During today’s hearing, Ms Munroe, who is black, also spoke of experiencing racist behaviours from staff “overtly and covertly.” 

Disciplinary processes and outcomes for black staff were more severe than for white staff, she claimed. 

Ms Munroe said: “I’d been relieved of my job because of the use of foul language — the officer that used foul language towards me still works there, and is a manager now.”

She said she also found a photo on his Facebook page of her colleague donning blackface.

The inquiry continues next week.