A prison officer has been sentenced to jail after she was caught performing a sex act on an inmate by her own bodycam footage.
46-year-old Rebecca Pinckard had an 'intimate encounter' with 42-year-old Erion Nakdi in a supply cupboard at HMP Highpoint in Suffolk on 5 July 2024.
Prosecutors said that two video clips, five minutes apart from Pinckard's bodycam, showed her performing a sex act on the convicted criminal, who is serving a 16-year sentence for drug offences.
Cambridge Crown Court was also told that the woman had sent a Moonpig card to the Albanian national on 10 April, 2024, and that she had admitted misconduct at an earlier hearing.
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The footage from her bodycam was only found after another officer was reviewing it for evidence and discovered the videos, and yesterday (16 January), Pinckard was jailed for 32 weeks.
Judge Anthony Cartin said that all of this was only brought to light due to a 'clumsy mistake' and told the former prison officer that her 'conduct diminishes the public confidence in the criminal justice system'.
He said: "Your camera had been activated during the intimate encounter. The offence wasn’t a one-off, it went on for a number of months and the card was sent."
Prosecutor Gavin Burrell said that sexual videos of Nakdi were recovered from Pinckard's phone, and it was 'accepted the videos were filmed in prison then sent via social media by messaging'.
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However, the phone on which the videos were originally filmed 'has never been recovered', the prosecutor said, while the judge noted that she did not report receiving the videos when they were sent to her.
The court had also been told that Pinckard had been warned in October 2023 about her behaviour and being 'overfamiliar' with prisoners.
Nakdi admitted to the court that he had unauthorised possession of a mobile phone in prison and was sentenced to a further 10 months consecutive to his existing prison time.
Representing Nakdi, Rory Keene said the device was a 'pool phone' and described the whole matter as 'a tragic case of an emotional attraction between two people'.
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Speaking for Pinckard, Juliet Donovan said what happened was a 'moment of madness' and 'not a relationship', claiming that the former prison officer had just left a 19-year relationship and been going through a 'particularly difficult' period in her life.
She said the prison officer had sent the card to Nakdi because 'he had been having problems with his girlfriend' and she had been attempting to 'cheer him up', adding that she had not given him her mobile number.
Donovan said that the former prison officer had been giving 'cakes and sweets' to inmates as she was 'naively and stupidly trying to make the lives of prisoners somewhat better'.
Joe Harker