UK- High Court frees thousands to challenge place on sex offenders register

12-20-2008 United Kingdom:

Thousands of convicted sex attackers won the right to challenge being on the sex offenders register for life today after a landmark High Court ruling.

Three judges said that indefinitely placing sex offenders on the register with no right of a review is a breach of their human rights.

The test case opens the way for thousands of individuals to try to get off the list on the basis that there is no longer a risk that they will reoffend.

Tonight the Home Office said that it was extremely disappointed with the ruling and is urgently considering an appeal. There are 31,392 sex offenders on the register. Anyone given a sentence of more than 30 months for a sex crime automatically goes on the register for life.

The ruling came in test cases involving a teenager, known as F who cannot be identified, and an adult, Angus Thompson.

Lord Justice Latham, Mr Justice Underhill and Mr Justice Flaux said that the existing registration scheme wrongly denied them the chance to prove in a review that they no longer posed a risk of reoffending.

The judges said that both applicants were entitled to declarations that the scheme was incompatible with their Article 8 right to private and family life under the European Convention on Human Rights.

Lord Justice Latham said that it might well be that any right of review “should be tightly subscribed in the public interest”. He warned that an offender might find it very difficult to establish that he no longer presented any risk of re-offending.

“But I find it difficult to see how it could be justifiable in Article 8 terms to deny a person who believes himself to be in that position an opportunity to seek to establish it.”

Lawyers for the applicants argued they should be entitled to appeal to come off the register and stop having to notify the police of their personal details, including whether they intended to travel abroad.

F, now 16, was convicted of two offences of rape and other serious offences at the age of 11. He was sentenced to 30 months’ detention by Liverpool Crown Court in October 2005 and was released on licence in January 2007.

Last year F’s family booked a holiday in Spain, but he was unable to travel as approval had not been given, the High Court was told.

Later his local youth offending team wrote to his mother making it clear that, as he was on the sex offenders register, he would need to notify the authorities of his travel plans “for the remainder of his life”.

Hugh Southey, appearing for F, said that as there was no review process — he could still be on the register “aged 70 or 80”, even if he committed no further offence.

Pete Weatherby, appearing on behalf of Thompson, argued that adults were also entitled to periodic reviews.

Thompson, from Newcastle Upon Tyne, was sentenced in November 1996 to five years’ imprisonment on two counts of indecent assault on a female and other offences of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

The court heard that e had since been released and he had not been in any more trouble.

The Home Office and Ministry of Justice were unable to say how many people are on the register for life.

A Home Office official said: “We are extremely disappointed with today's High Court judgement and are now considering an appeal.”

The official added: “The UK has one of the most robust systems of managing sex offenders in the world. The notification requirements form an important part of this system.

“They provide an invaluable tool to the authorities in allowing the police to keep track of the whereabouts of individual sex offenders and managing the risk of known sex offenders.” ..News Source.. by Richard Ford Home Correspondent.