Man taken off sex offenders register despite concerns he may have deceived the team assessing the risk he posed

The Royal Court

A MAN who admitted making and distributing indecent images of children has been taken off the sex offenders register after more than a decade – despite a probation service report speculating that he may have deceived the team assessing the risk he posed.


In an application heard in private, the Royal Court decided to remove requirements under the Sex Offenders Law 2010 that the man must notify the police of names he used and his address. He was not identified in the court’s judgment.


Noting that the policy in such cases was to maintain notification requirements where offenders scored at least a moderate risk of causing sexual harm to the public according to assessment tests, the court said that the man now posed only a low risk, having co-operated with the authorities and not re-offended while on the register.


But it also noted that, while the probation service concluded that the applicant’s risk of sexual reconviction was low, it had expressed a reservation over the applicant’s behaviour.


‘Mr Taylor [of the probation service] does highlight that given the significant decrease in risk there is the concern that the applicant may have manipulated the team or there may be “disguised compliance”. Mr Taylor does recognise, however, that there is no current evidence or police intelligence to raise the risk assessment and there has been a gradual decline in the applicant’s risk assessment over the course of the past 11 years,’ said the presiding judge, Commissioner Julian Clyde-Smith.


The Commissioner, who was sitting with Jurats Gareth Hughes and Karen Le Cornu, said that the court’s test was whether, on the balance of probabilities, the risk of sexual harm to the public posed by the risk of reoffending justified keeping the notification requirements of the register in place.


‘The respondent submits and the court agrees that in light of the low risk assessments the imposition of the notification requirements is no longer justified. In considering the application, the court notes that the applicant has engaged with offender management unit officers whilst he has been subject to the notification requirements.

Further, there have been no known breaches of the notification requirements or restraining orders,’ he continued.


No details were given by the court of the original offences or the date on which they occurred although they involved guilty pleas to five counts of making an indecent photograph of a child, six of inciting the making of an indecent photograph of a child and two of distributing indecent photographs of children.

The man had a previous conviction in 2004 for single counts of possession of indecent photographs, distribution of indecent photographs and of possessing indecent photographs with a view to their being distributed.

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