Incompetency Is Fuelling The Crime Crisis
Every Western Australian knows a woman in her 40’s. She might be your wife, your sister, your aunt, your cousin, your mother, your daughter, your granddaughter or your friend. She should be able to return from the train station without being attacked by a registered sex offender that the Government were supposed to be supervising.
It was distressing to read a report in this newspaper about such an incident in the final month of 2024 which has now led to charges being laid against the alleged criminal. Thankfully his application for bail was denied by a Magistrate.
Community concern compounded in this case with the revelation that the alleged attacker had been released from prison the previous month on a Post-Sentence Supervision Order.
A PSSO can be given to certain offenders for a period of up to two years after their term of imprisonment or parole period has ended. Its sole purpose is to protect the community by supervising the offender.
So, it is hardly surprising that Western Australians are asking questions about the supervision in this case.
What were the supervision requirements? Were they adhered to or was there a failure? Is this seriously the highest standard of supervision that the community can expect from the Government of a registered sex offender whose history was of sufficient concern to warrant him being under an order for “supervision”?
Unacceptably there has been nothing but silence from the Premier and his retiring Attorney General about this horrific incident. Instead, the Government heartlessly had a spokesperson issue this nonsensical boast, “under our regime, which is the strongest in Australia, perpetrators subject to a HRSO or PSSO supervision order are closely monitored by the community offender monitoring unit and WA Police”.
Closely monitored? Well, evidently not in this case!
Does the Premier realise that a strong regime means nothing unless it is being rigorously enforced?
Premier Cook needs to personally check what went wrong here and release the details publicly. This could be done within a day if he really wanted to.
Meanwhile, how many more serious offenders are not currently being supervised at a standard that we would expect from a responsible government?
Past history tells us that the Premier will likely hide behind a convenient shield saying that governments do not comment on matters before the courts. In doing so, he entirely misses the point yet again. The community does not need Mr Cook’s opinion on the alleged criminality. The judicial system will determine that. What the community needs is for the Premier to be accountable for the level of supervision that his Government had a duty to execute.
In 2024 we heard Premier Cook ramp up his rhetoric on crime, even referring to ‘shackling thugs’. What Western Australia needs in 2025 is a Premier who will make sure sex offenders are being monitored & supervised rather than one who is all talk.
Our State can ill-afford a repeat of 2024 when it comes to tackling the crime crisis.
It was Premier Cook who sat silent last year as Attorney General Quigley arranged the release of Ian Richard Conole who was supposed to be on a life sentence after killing his ex-wife. His crime was made all the more repugnant when he forced his ex-wife to write a farewell letter to her own children. The decision to release this murderer was particularly outrageous given the psychological risk assessment concluded he had “a lack of insight into the violent nature of his offence”.
Meanwhile, it was Premier Cook who sat silent last year while his Police Minister stonewalled Parliament for months about the details of prison fugitives. These are offenders who have fled and are subject to return to prison warrants. Keeping their details secret from the community has only helped these criminals stay a step ahead. The year ended in farce with the Minister releasing details of 19 prison fugitives but ridiculously keeping secret the details of 18 others.
Our community expects that the Premier will not sit silent while his Attorney General allows a vile murderer on a “life sentence” to be released.
Our community expects that if a prison fugitive is on the run, the Premier will ensure we are told who this offender is so that we can all be on the look out for this person who shows no regard for the law of our State.
Of course, our community does not expect the Premier to stop every criminal offence from occurring. No Premier is able to do that. However, it is an entirely different situation if Parliament passes a law (as the last Liberal Government did in 2016) enabling the Government of the day to supervise a registered sex offender. Then we expect serious supervision and if something goes horribly wrong we expect serious answers.
Hon Nick Goiran MLC is Western Australia’s Shadow Attorney General and Shadow Minister for Child Protection