If you were to take a baking dish and generously grease it with animal fat, take two slices of shit house rat, add a cup of dim wit, a sprinkle of fox cunning, a pinch of treachery, the heart of a baby pea and add a large cup of cowardice, ensure you leave out common sense, ethics, decency, law abiding principals and honour, bake for nine months at 36 degrees Celsius you will end up with a Peter Schneidas.
I have heard many “outsiders” refer to Schneidas as the most hated crim by Prison Officers. This is not true. Professional Prison Officers do not hate any prisoner. They do the job because they have too much respect and love for those people who are law abiding and never see the inside of the walls. Prison Officers want to protect these people from those who cannot, and will not conform to society’s laws.
Peter Schneidas was born in August 1957 making him nine years younger than me. I was told that as a young boy he had committed a number of minor offences and ended up continually going through the revolving door of the prison system. Firstly at Tamworth Institution for Boys and progressed to adult institutions.
Somewhere along the line he ended up at Katingal however I have no idea why. From Katingal he was housed in 13 wing where I was on “D” watch. When I arrived for duty Schneidas was already housed on the middle landing.
At 16.00 hours the prisoners had been mustered and locked in the wing however they were able to roam around on their own landing until 20.30 hours. At about 16.30 hours Schneidas had a confrontation with a young baggy arse Prison Officer on the middle landing. The Officer phoned me and asked me to come up and lock the prisoner up.
When I arrived on the middle landing Schneidas was surrounded by a dozen or so other crims. I said to Schneidas, “Go to your cell Schneidas, you’re locked up.” Schneidas bluntly replied, “Get fucked Egge I’m not going”. I could tell by his extreme body language he was ready to fight and so were most of his disciples. I simply said to the officer on the landing, “Go and sit in your office and don’t come out of it”.
I walked back downstairs knowing there were only three officers in the wing, one on each landing and150 maximum security prisoners running around loose, discretion being the better part of valour. I returned to my office, closed the door and phoned the superintendent George Brown. I said “Mr Brown I’ve just had a confrontation with prisoner Peter Schneidas who refused to be locked up by the young Officer on the landing and when I went up to lock him up he told me to ‘get fucked’ and had surrounded himself with a dozen other crims who were ready to fight”. Mr Brown said “what do you want me to do Mr Egge?” I said, “Remove him back to Katingal, if he’s not moved you won’t have any Officers working in your gaol”.
Five minutes later Mr Brown phoned me back and said “It will take 20 minutes Mr Egge will that be alright” I said “Thank you sir that will be fine”. I was very concerned that I may have over stepped my mark. I had great respect for Mr Brown and I had never spoken to him that way before.
Schneidas and his boys were looking very pleased with themselves and were running around the landing as if they owned it. I’m sure the Officer on the landing thought I had lost my heart too. 20 minutes on the dot, the wing door opened and in came three of the biggest SOD Squad Officers that I had ever seen, led by the ex Grafton Officer, commonly referred to as the white Alsatian, along with some MEU Officers, the Night Senior and Mr Brown.
Without saying a word we all walked straight up the stairs to Schneidas, surprise is invaluable. All his so called army deserted him without hesitation. Schneidas was instructed by the SOD Officers to collect his gear he was moving, to which Schneidas enquired “where to?” The officer said “Katingal”. I laughed when Schneidas said “Could I have a shit first please?” The Officers stripped searched him and removed Schneidas out of my life for a while.
Following the closure of Katingal which was a recommendation of the Royal Commission into Prisons, a few years after the above incident had taken place, an unarmed First Class Prison Officer John Mewburn, a mild mannered man, quietly spoken and a very decent all round human being, was the victim of a cold, calculated, callous and cowardly attack from behind by Schneidas with a claw hammer, inflicting such severe injuries as to cost him his life. May our Lord bless his soul and surviving family.
