What records does Corrections not hold?

Some records may not have been kept, or may have been destroyed under a disposal schedule

Over time, different disposal schedules (a schedule that tells an organisation when to keep, move, or dispose of records) have applied to the Department of Corrections’ (Corrections) records. If Corrections cannot find your records, they need to let you know, and they should tell you why. 

Records about someone’s time in a youth penal institution might be in records created for them as an adult under the management of Corrections. Unfortunately, it is possible that no records have been kept from someone’s time in a youth penal institution.

Some records have been destroyed under previous disposal schedules, unfortunately Corrections does not know which records have been kept or destroyed.  

Below are some examples of why some records may have been destroyed: 

• From 1959, borstal and penal reform institution prisoner files were supposed to be kept for 20 years then destroyed.   
• A records schedule used during the 1980s required that some files would be kept for 20 years and destroyed (with some not being destroyed as a sample). Corrections does not know whether peoples’ files for borstals or Youth Centres were sampled and kept. 
• In 1969, Waikeria Youth Centre said they destroyed a range of records, including records about prisoners (for example, records of why people were moved to other facilities and records of accidents).    

From 2012-2013 onwards, prisoner records are no longer destroyed at Corrections sites. This process is now controlled centrally from their National Office.