Prisoners jailed more than six months will face mental tests in a security shake-up following the slaying of Antje Herkommer by a psychopath.

The psychological screening at the new prison will try to weed out crazed killers like Leroy Burgess.

And all inmates will be banned from leaving the $40 million complex unsupervised.

The moves are part of a battery of measures to tighten security -- and ween inmates back to society.

It signals a massive shift from custody and control to correction, say prison chiefs.

"We are appealing for a change in public attitude to imprisonment,'' prison psychologist Dr. Derrick Binns said yesterday.

"We want the support of the community in what we are trying to do.'' Inmates at the new prison, which also has a remand centre, are likely to be split into maximum and medium security risks.

They will be put into separate blocks -- with differing privileges, which will be earned through good behaviour.

Any who serve six months or more will have to undergo rigorous scrutiny.

As well as psychological and medical assessment, they will face tests for their "educational, social, recreational, and vocational needs,'' said Dr.

Binns.

Those inmates believed to have a psychological disorder will face two further in-depth tests.

A deranged killer like Burgess -- labelled an incurable psychopath -- should be picked out at this stage.

Prison chiefs are likely to order all violent and sex offenders to automatically receive this intensive screening.

"It is a policy that will have to be worked out,'' said Prison Commissioner Mr. Edward Dyer.

Mr. Dyer said the classification of inmates into maximum and minimum security risks had not been finalised.

A task force was investigating how best to do it, he added.

"What we don't want is an over-complicated system with so many categories it gets confusing.'' Minimum risk inmates would be sent to the prison farm, where they could join work programmes supervised by civilian employers, said Mr. Dyer.

Under the new regime, those deemed a medium risk will be eligible to join work programmes overseen by prison officers.

No maximum security risk prisoner will be eligible for a work programme.

Burgess would never have been allowed to join the Dockyard work programme he was on when he killed the 27-year-old German tourist.

But prisoners will be able to lower their security rating through good behaviour.

Dr. Binns and Mr. Dyer stress the new prison regime will be harder in many ways for inmates.

Although security will be tighter, they will be expected to take on more responsibility.

"Too many prisoners now spend their lives being told what to do, and once they leave don't know how to fend for themselves,'' said Mr. Dyer.

"We need to change this to make them think for themselves and take their own decisions.

"We are looking at a whole new way of doing things. We won't even be calling this a prison -- rather a correction facility,'' said Mr. Dyer.