Five-day wait until sex offender moved

Corrections officials took five days to remove a child sex offender from a motel after they found children were also staying at the accommodation, a new report into the debacle has revealed.

A review into the situation carried out by the Ministry of Social Development and an independent review by KPMG were released by the ministry yesterday.

The ministry and Corrections have been under intense scrutiny since August when Stuff revealed a breakdown in communication led to a notorious child sex offender, who was subject to a 10-year extended supervision order, being housed in a Palmerston North motel alongside 16 vulnerable families, with 41 children.

The KPMG report, commissioned by the ministry, included recommendations about ways the two government organisations could improve their processes. It says they will be undertaking an eight-week post implementation review.

The ministry report says the child sex offender, who has temporary name suppression, was placed in the motel, whose name is also suppressed, by Corrections after consultation with the motel owner. Corrections says the motel owner advised it there were no families with children residing at the motel on an ongoing basis.

Corrections said on July 20 its officials learned families with children were staying at the motel and on July 25, when they moved the child sex offender from the motel, they were made aware of possible contact with children.

The 66-year-old was taken into custody on July 26 amid fears he’d abused some of the children in the nearly three months he lived there. A police investigation found no evidence of criminal offending.

The ministry review says daily information sharing on motel usage was now in place between the ministry and Corrections, and they had a process in place to share information and check suitability of accommodation before released offenders are placed.

This was implemented in July. However, on the evening of August 14, four days after Stuff revealed details of the Palmerston North incident, officials found vulnerable families living at two other motels with child sex offenders.

KPMG’S review reveals there were still concerns about some of the changes implemented, including the time it would take to check suitability, ministry staff having difficulties contacting Corrections officers and the ministry not being able to disclose confidential information to clients about potential risks.

The incident in Palmerston North highlighted a lack of information sharing between Corrections and the ministry, the review says, but in the months since the ministry has worked with Corrections and made significant improvements to mitigate risk.

The incident in Palmerston North highlighted a lack of information sharing between Corrections and the ministry.