Two victims of the serial sexual attacker John Worboys have launched a crowdfunding appeal for a legal challenge against the controversial decision to free him from prison.

The women are aiming to raise £10,000 to pay for a judicial review that would initially force the Parole Board to reveal its reasons for releasing the 60-year-old, who has served 10 years in jail.

The legal initiative follows an announcement by the justice secretary, David Gauke, that he is considering a similar legal action over the board’s decision.

Q&A Why is John Worboys being released and can the decision be reversed? Show The Parole Board is able to assess the continued risk posed by prisoners based on psychiatrist and prison guard reports at Parole Board hearings that take place around once a year for each offender. Some of the hearings are oral, some of them written.

In November, a three-person panel of the Parole Board directed the release of Worboys, following an oral hearing. He will be released back into society under strict monitoring on a licence period of at least 10 years. Parole Board hearings are held in private and reasons for release are not made public, although a consultation is to be launched on how the body shares its decision-making with the public. The Parole Board is an independent body and its recommendation for Worboys’ release cannot be overturned by the Ministry of Justice. There are examples of Parole Board decisions being challenged by judicial review in the courts, but only when the prisoner has been denied release. Read a fuller explainer on John Worboys

The head of the Parole Board, Nick Hardwick, has defended the ruling, warning politicians not to interfere in the independence of the justice system.

Worboys was jailed indefinitely in 2009, with a minimum term of eight years, for drugging and sexually assaulting female passengers. The former black-cab driver was convicted of 19 offences against 12 victims but police have linked him to more than 100 complaints in total.

Harriet Wistrich, a solicitor at Birnberg Peirce and director of the Centre for Women’s Justice, who is organising the legal challenge said it would be unprecedented.

“Where a decision appears to be so irrational, as it does in this case given all the known facts, there is an arguable basis to challenge the rules preventing publication of reasons,” she said.



“If we get access to the reasons then we can explore grounds for challenging a decision which is so insulting and horrific for all the victims concerned.”

The two women, who cannot be identified and are known only as DSD and NBV, are still waiting for a judgment from the supreme court after they sued the Metropolitan police over its failure to carry out an effective investigation into Worboys’ crimes.



“I can’t watch the news or read the papers,” NBV said. “My heart freezes when I hear his name. Seeing his face makes me feel unwell. He’s ruining my life all over again.”



A “letter before claim” has been sent to the Parole Board requesting that Worboys’ release be halted pending the outcome of the legal proceedings.



In September 2015, the board decided not to transfer Worboys to open conditions from a category A jail.

Richard Scorer, a solicitor with the law firm Slater and Gordon who represents 11 of Worboys’ victims, said: “Our clients fully support this bid for a judicial review and urge people to support the crowdfunding.



“It is also imperative that police and the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] look again at the allegations against Worboys that did not go before a criminal court so those victims can get justice.”

Hardwick wrote on Tuesday: “We should be open to legal challenge, but I hope people will agree that it is right that we resist political interference in our decisions.



“It would be a bad day for us all if people’s rightful abhorrence of Worboys’ crimes or concern about a Parole Board decision allowed these basic principles of justice to be overturned.”