Council and police ordered to pay £52k to claimant over housing of sex offender
Leicester City Council and the Chief Constable of Leicestershire have been ordered by the High Court to pay in all £52,000 to a claimant JW after a level 3 sex offender was housed near to the children’s home in which he lived.
The payment was directed to be split 80% by Leicestershire Police and 20% by Leicester City Council.
Stephen Simblet of Garden Court Chambers, who appeared for W, said in a commentary on the case, that the level 3 offender - one posing the most risk - was given a council tenancy at an address “a stone’s throw” from the children’s home.
Police approved the property without visiting it, which HHJ Hampton found a serious failure on the part of the multi-agency process to identify the home or share information with its senior staff about the offender’s presence.
HHJ Hampton ruled that the offender would not have been placed in this accommodation had the police officer concerned made himself aware that there was a children’s home nearby.
She found that staff at the home had not adequately followed up concerns raised independently by the police prior to the placement of the offender that JW might be being sexually exploited but found that staff took active steps to warn and advise JW of the dangers of alcohol abuse and substance abuse. HHJ Hampton was satisfied that staff had reasonably believed that the cause of JW’s challenging behaviour was ongoing difficulties in his family relationships. The staff there did not breach their duty to him and were not liable for any harm caused.
A Leicester City Council spokesman said: "The city council will be seeking permission to appeal this judgement and it would therefore be inappropriate to comment further at this stage.”
Laura Broadhead, a solicitor with law firm Browne Jacobson, said in her account of the case that the offender was released in the Leicester area after an earlier conviction and managed by a Sexual Offences Prevention Order.
The police asked the council to find accommodation for the offender because of the difficulty of monitoring sex offenders if they were homeless.
He was placed in a property near to the children’s home and befriended and groomed JW, sexually abusing him on three occasions. The offender was subsequently convicted of abuse.
Ms Broadhead said police evidence given at trial showed the officer concerned had not visited the property in which the offender was to be housed, but had relied on a colleague’s earlier risk assessment of a nearby property.
She said the judge’s decision imposed liability “not only on lead agencies with responsibility to risk manage and monitor offenders in the community but appears to tread new ground, attributing liability to other agencies in attendance at multi-agency meetings who do not volunteer information over and above what is asked of them”.
Mark Smulian
