Hostage taker poses risk on release: parole board

An Alberta man who took nine hostages in an Edmonton office building in 2009 still poses a danger to society and should be moved to a halfway house when granted automatic release, the federal parole board says.

Patrick Clayton, 45, is scheduled for mandatory release June 12, but the parole board recommends the new condition in addition to others he’s been under on day parole.

“The board finds that a real potential for violent behaviour continues to exist in your case,” the board said in its latest decision for Clayton released Friday. “The board has noted the connection between substance abuse and your violent, threatening index offences.”

Clayton was granted day parole in November after serving about four years of his six-year, 10-month sentence.

In October 2009, he stormed a Workers’ Compensation Board office with a loaded rifle and held hostages at gunpoint for about 10 hours. For weeks leading up to the crime, he did not eat, barely slept and smoked up to 14 grams of crack cocaine a day.

After sentencing in November 2011, he was placed in two prisons in Edmonton, then held at the medium-security Mission Institution east of Vancouver.

On day parole he completed a 70-day residential treatment program in the Fraser Valley, then was transferred to a residential treatment centre on Vancouver Island.

In March he was moved to an undisclosed location.

The board said Clayton has used drugs while on parole and called his attitude “entitled” after explaining he was celebrating his birthday.