We do our due dilligence when rehoming registered sex offenders

Those in charge of dealing with registered sex offenders have this week told the Post how it all works.

And MAPPA coordinator Allan Woods insists: “The end product is that we can confidently say we manage these individuals very well.”

MAPPA, aka Multi- Agency Public Protection Arrangements, is a set of statutory partnership working arrangements introduced in 2007 under the Management of Offenders etc. ( Scotland) Act 2005.

Allan is in charge of dealing with the 112 on the register in South Ayrshire, as well as those in the rest of Ayrshire and Dumfries and Galloway.

When an offender leaves jail Allan brings together the police, the prison service, health and the local authorities to t assess and d manage th the risk i k posed df for certain categories of offender.

Allan explains: “All agencies share information, go into databases, and share everything we know about the individual.

“We can do this under a confidentiality statement that allows us to do that safely – and from that we can usually identify what is the risk that we are managing.

“There is a perception that every registered sex offender ( RSO) is a risk to children. That is not that case.

“Some certainly are, but we tailor their risk management plans and that’s what comes out of a MAPPA meeting.

“Quite often you’ll hear people ranting that there is a ‘ peado’ housed right across from a school – the reality is that would never happen.

“But if someone isn’t a risk in any way, shape h or form f to t kids – then we don’t really have to consider that.”

Allan admits there is no perfect place to house a registered sex offender.

At a MAPPA meeting it is the job of Housing to identify the best place to put an individual.

“Trust me, that’s a difficult task,” says Allan. “I don’t think there is a perfect house. But we must house them, we are required to house them.

“What we do is called an environmental risk assessment ( ERA) and again we gather information about the district, how many children are there, how many childminders are there, vulnerable people.

“The police can tell us their intelligence in terms of who’s there.

“If the social work and local police sergeant t of fth the Off Offender d M Management t Unit approves the ERA then that’s where we’ll put them.”

Detective Inspector Nathan Calderwood heads up the Offender Management Unit in South Ayrshire.

Nathan’s job is to provide quality assurance and “enforce the standards in all aspects of risk management”, from a policing point of view.

Nathan said: “In conjunction with Chief Inspector Brian Anderson, we’ll ensure that all risk management plans are implemented correctly.

“I’ll attend and chair MAPPA meetings, ensuring we are pivotal at sharing information.

“My job is just to make sure from a policing point of view we have that professional approach and the risk management plans are tailored appropriately. As Allan explained,

MAPPA isn’t about the police. We play a vital role, but it’s a partnership approach and MAPPA only works when we have partners.”

Brian says the work that goes on behind the scenes in the police department is also pivotal in keeping the public safe.

The Area Commander said: “There’s a partnership approach which works internally within the police.

“My community policing officers are out in the community, they see these individuals and how they interact with others.

“There’s a whole host of work that goes on under those MAPPA arrangements.

Nathan’s team regularly share information – whether that’s the type of car they drive, who they associate with, where they frequent – that type of basis.

“The local officers have the most up to date information and we can feed that information back to Nathan’s team and in turn back to that wider MAPPA approach Allan has described.”

Allan insists this system works really well and he says the reoffending rate of RSOs is very low.

“I’m happy to say that 70 to 80 per cent of the RSOs out there are considered to be of relatively low risk, that means we think it’s unlikely they will commit another offence,” he says.

“However, there are others that come out of jail, and we have no power to stop them, and the risk assessment tools comes out at high or very high, and that’s where we put all our resources.

“But for individuals who are managed under the MAPPA process only 0.16 per cent go on to commit another sexual offence. That’s 1.6 in every 1,000.

“That’s why I’m confident that the MAPPA process works. It’s not perfect, and we will always strive for that, but the end product is that we can confidently say we manage these individuals.”