Right to review reviewed
16/08/2009
In a recent case it was ruled that forcing convicted sex offenders to remain on the sex offenders register was a breach of their human rights. In an interview for Lexis Nexis Butterworths News (published 13/8/09) Gavin Jones spoke to
Pete Weatherby
, barrister at Garden Court North Chambers.
The case (JF & Anor,R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2009] EWCA Civ 792) concerned whether the defendant, a convicted sex offender, had a right to review being enforced to remain on the register for the rest of their lives.
Extracts from the article as follows:
Initially commenting on the judgment Weatherby states: “The effect of the ruling is to prompt Parliament to rectify this anomaly. What’s controversial about the ruling is that reviews will allow judgments to be made as to whether or not previously-convicted offenders will re-offend at a future point in their lives...It is likely that there will be a minimum time to elapse before application can be made for the notification requirements to be set aside, and the onus will be on the offender to prove he is no longer a risk. Proving a negative is obviously difficult. However, the SoS’s [secretary of state] own evidence (a substantial amount was disclosed in the course of this case) and the claimant’s evidence concurred that after a period of time (perhaps 15 years) the statistical risk of an un-reconvicted sex offender being convicted of another sex offence is about the same as for the general population.”
Pete Weatherby also comments on whether the Sexual Ofences Act 2003, s82 has been successful in re-offense prevention, on international precedents for rights to review in such cases, and on the subject of sexual offenders re-offending as compared to other crimes he adds:
"In fact intra-familial sex offenders rarely re-offend; so the real problem is first-time offenders (unlike other areas of criminal law; burglars re-offend at the rate of about 75 per cent within two years of release from custody). Sex offenders in general have a markedly lower rate of re-offending than other crimes, and I have seen no evidence that the rate of sexual offending or re-offending has decreased since 1997. The notification requirements must also impose a considerable burden on police resources.”
Quick links
> The full article can be found on under Current Awareness on the Lexis Nexis Butterworths network (subscription only) ref: LNB News 13/08/2009 27 "The Right to Review Reviewed". Click here to sign in if you have an account.
> 23/7/09 - Court of Appeal upholds sex offender register ruling
