Oresai
12-29-2008, 10:14 AM
Source, Daily Record online.
Exclusive: Sex beasts on loose thanks to legal loophole
Dec 29 2008 By Stephen Stewart
SEX beasts are exploiting a legal loophole by claiming to be homeless to avoid police supervision.
People who have been placed on the sex offenders' register have to provide an address to ensure they can be monitored.
But dozens have registered themselves as homeless, so they can effectively disappear.
They still have to supply a contact address - but this does not have to be a permananent home.
Some have given police the addresses of job centres, libraries and even a cemetery.
The Record can reveal that in the last three years, at least 35 registered sex offenders in Scotland have taken advantage of the legal loophole.
Of the forces who had figures readily available, Lothian and Borders Police said 18 offenders had been registered as homeless in their area, Grampian had 12 and Strathclyde five. Tayside said they had no registered sex offenders logged as homeless.
Martin Henry, of Stop It Now Scotland, a sexual abuse prevention programme, said: "Authorities are trying to monitor offenders but are doing that within the obvious imperfections of the law."
Under sex offenders' register rules, an address is needed in order to make regular checks on offenders and to ensure they have support to help them avoid reoffending.
The sex offenders' register contains the details of anyone convicted, cautioned or released from prison for sexual offences against children or adults.
The loophole is believed to have existed since the register was established in 1997 but has never been made public.
In 2002, Brian Travers, a homeless sex offender from Edinburgh, was sentenced to life for a sex attack on a university lecturer.
The case came five years after he had been given a seven-year jail term for a sexual assault on a 20-year-old American student in the city.
Eight-year-old Mark Cummings was killed in 2004 by sex offender Stuart Leggate, who was living in the same tower block in Glasgow.
Paul Martin, MSP for Glasgow Springburn and the Cummings' MSP, said: "Stuart Leggate was homeless before he moved into a house but the local housing association was not informed that he was a sex offender.
"If the authorities allow predators to register as homeless and avoid monitoring, we are making it even easier for a tragic situation like Mark's to happen again."
Exclusive: Sex beasts on loose thanks to legal loophole
Dec 29 2008 By Stephen Stewart
SEX beasts are exploiting a legal loophole by claiming to be homeless to avoid police supervision.
People who have been placed on the sex offenders' register have to provide an address to ensure they can be monitored.
But dozens have registered themselves as homeless, so they can effectively disappear.
They still have to supply a contact address - but this does not have to be a permananent home.
Some have given police the addresses of job centres, libraries and even a cemetery.
The Record can reveal that in the last three years, at least 35 registered sex offenders in Scotland have taken advantage of the legal loophole.
Of the forces who had figures readily available, Lothian and Borders Police said 18 offenders had been registered as homeless in their area, Grampian had 12 and Strathclyde five. Tayside said they had no registered sex offenders logged as homeless.
Martin Henry, of Stop It Now Scotland, a sexual abuse prevention programme, said: "Authorities are trying to monitor offenders but are doing that within the obvious imperfections of the law."
Under sex offenders' register rules, an address is needed in order to make regular checks on offenders and to ensure they have support to help them avoid reoffending.
The sex offenders' register contains the details of anyone convicted, cautioned or released from prison for sexual offences against children or adults.
The loophole is believed to have existed since the register was established in 1997 but has never been made public.
In 2002, Brian Travers, a homeless sex offender from Edinburgh, was sentenced to life for a sex attack on a university lecturer.
The case came five years after he had been given a seven-year jail term for a sexual assault on a 20-year-old American student in the city.
Eight-year-old Mark Cummings was killed in 2004 by sex offender Stuart Leggate, who was living in the same tower block in Glasgow.
Paul Martin, MSP for Glasgow Springburn and the Cummings' MSP, said: "Stuart Leggate was homeless before he moved into a house but the local housing association was not informed that he was a sex offender.
"If the authorities allow predators to register as homeless and avoid monitoring, we are making it even easier for a tragic situation like Mark's to happen again."