Sex offender register breaches THEIR rights - paedophiles can apply to 'clean the slate', say judges

Paedophiles and rapists yesterday won the right to have their names removed from the Sex Offenders Register in a landmark human rights ruling.

Appeal Court judges ruled sex offenders who no longer pose a threat should be given the chance to have their names wiped off the police database.

The decision has outraged victims' groups who fear sexual predators will commit further crimes without any restrictions or supervision of their movements.

The case comes after two convicted sex attackers, including a child rapist, went to the High Court arguing that being on the register for life was a breach of their human rights.

Landmark decision: The Court Of Appeal ruled that sex offenders who no longer pose a threat will have their names removed from the police database

Currently those given a jail sentence of more than 30 months for sex crimes are placed on the register indefinitely. That means they have to notify the authorities of any change of address or name and any foreign travel plans. But Lord Justice Dyson said it was 'disproportionate' to keep an offender's name on it forever.

The court ruled the 2003 Sexual Offenders Act was incompatible with a criminal's right to a private and family life under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Yesterday the Home Office announced it would appeal against the ruling which legal experts predict will force Parliament to change the law.



Once that happens, thousands of sex offenders will be able to demand reviews of their cases and that their names be removed from the register and police databases. There are currently 31,392 sex offenders on the register. Furious campaigners last night blasted the decision. Spokesman for the National Victims' Association Neil Atkinson said: 'It's an appalling decision.

'This is a category of crime that is tremendously difficult to monitor because the criminals themselves have been proven to lie to authorities about their possibility of reoffending.'

The test case was first brought before the High Court last year by a child rapist who argued his name should be taken off the register because it prevented him from going on family holidays.

The teenager from Wigan, identified only as 'F', was just 11 when he was convicted of raping a child under 13 and other sexual offences in 2005.

He was handed a 30-month youth custody sentence at Liverpool Crown Court and placed on the Sex Offenders Register for life. But he complained he was unable to go on a family holiday in 2007 due to restrictions placed on foreign travel.

There were also concerns that having his name on the Sex Offenders Register would damage his career prospects. Those on the register are allowed to keep their passports and travel abroad if they notify police about their plans.

Police would only impose a travel ban if they received specific intelligence to suggest the offender planned to commit offences abroad.

The High Court also considered the rights of another sex offender, Angus Aubrey Thompson, 51, from Newcastle, who was jailed for five years in 1996 for indecent assaults on a girl.

He was released on licence in 2000 and has since suffered a series of heart attacks and is stricken by arthritis.

The court heard that the stress of being kept indefinitely on the Sex Offenders Register had contributed to his ill health.

The verdict concludes a case that began in December last year when High Court judges ruled that keeping offenders' names permanently on the register without review violated their human rights.

Yesterday a Home Office bid to overturn the ruling was rejected in the Court of Appeal.



