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	Where Are They Now? While Other States Make the Location of Sex Offenders Public, Ireland Is a Safe Haven, Writes Stephen Rogers By Dan Buckley One in Four October 15, 2006 http://www.oneinfour.org/news/news2006/whereare/ Tomorrow night cinema goers in the US will watch documentary footage of a convicted Irish paedophile priest ogling Irish children in a Dublin playground. He is Oliver O'Grady. He is in Ireland and he is real threat to our children. He is also one of 971 individuals on this country's sex offenders register. Do we have the right to be told where they live? The public in the US are given this information, and, to a lesser extent, so are people in Britain. Many would argue that the public in Ireland should also be informed of where sex offenders live, especially as there are major loopholes in this country's child protection laws. However, children in Ireland are being put at a greater risk than elsewhere because our legislation relating to sex offenders is highly inadequate, with no powers to arrest sex offenders from overseas who do not comply with the sex offenders act. A man or woman who has sexually assaulted a child or vulnerable adult in another jurisdiction is simply not traceable here. Paul Hunter Redpath, a convicted Scottish paedophile, has been sighted in Cork. Last month, Redpath, who was jailed for indecent assault and unlawful carnal knowledge of a 13-year-old girl, broke his probation conditions in the North, when he failed to return to approved accommodation. Gardaí have refused to comment on the case, but say they will, if asked, assist the PSNI. The problem with our system does not lie only with offenders coming from another jurisdiction. There are three times as many people on the sex offenders register here as there were three times ago. And, as an Oireachtas Committee heard this week, the gardaí are extremely poorly equipped to deal with the scale of that growing list of 971 names. Shockingly, the list is not computerised, but paper-based. Offenders are obliged to register regularly at a garda station, but not necessarily at a station near them. Do officers in the immediate area where individuals on the sex offenders register live, therefore, know the potential danger that person poses? Fine Gael justice spokesman and member of the Oireachtas Committee on Child Protection, Jim O'Keeffe, has said he is astounded at the gaping holes in this country's child protection legislation. The child protection committee is due to report back to the Dáil by the end of next month, and, he said, that report has to recommend a radical overhaul of child protection policy. The question of identifying sex offenders is at the crux of the problem, and is clearly illustrated by Limerick paedophile ex-priest, Oliver O'Grady, who has admitted molesting up to 25 children in America, and who has served seven years in prison. In a documentary, which hits cinema screens in the US tomorrow night, O'Grady admits he is turned on by the sight of children in their underwear. News of O'Grady's visit to Merrion Square has created a furore among Dubliners. Is it safe for their children to continue to use the park? At least one creche has said it will no longer bring children the playground situated there. RTÈ's liveline was inundated with calls from concerned people criticising American documentary-makers for filming the notorious paedophile watching children playing in a park. The question of who and where offenders are raises, meanwhile, ethical dilemmas. Do we have the right to know that there is a convicted sex offender living near us or our children? If offenders have served their time, do they have the right to anonymity? O'Grady admits he knew what he did was wrong - he even sought help. He has done his time in prison, but still believes he is a danger due to what the filmmakers describe as his 'illness'. Should those living close to O'Grady be made aware of this illness, so they can ensure their children will not cross his path? A law entitling the public to detailed information on registered sex offenders was introduced in various US states after seven-year-old Megan Nicole Kanka was raped and murdered, in 1994, by a neighbour whose previous convictions for child sex offences were unknown to residents. Deputy Jim O'Keeffe is an advocate of a similar version of that legislation being introduced here. He suggested to the child protection committee that legislation be brought in that would allow those with children in their care to be informed by gardaí if there is a registered sex offender living in their area. He added that some form of criminal offence should be created to prosecute those who abused that information. Ultimately, though, such legislation would require that the gardaí know exactly where offenders are in the first place, and it seems clear that they do not. The right to know: full access to a list of offenders could save lives - but disclosure has its pitfalls FOR years after her son Scott was murdered and his body discarded by a convicted paedophile, Patsy Simpson couldn't sleep. Each time she closed her eyes, she saw the face of her child staring back in her mind's eye. "For ages I was scared to sleep," says Ms Simpson, who still lives near the neighbourhood of Aberdeen in Scotland where police found her nine-year-old son's body crumpled in a rubbish skip. "Every time I closed my eyes, I relived everything." Eight years later, she concedes her pain feels just as sharp as it was on the day she and her husband Denny first learned of their son's fate. When Simpson lost her child, she lost her faith and her trust in humanity. Every person she now passes on the street becomes a possible threat to her family. "I used to be a happy-go-lucky person," she said. "Now I'm stressed out, paranoid and edgy." For Ms Simpson and other parents of children subjected to the attentions of a paedophile, time is no healer. They collectively shudder as their children's legacies become symbols of horror and are paraded on the evening news each time another child meets a similar fate. "You fill up with hate," Ms Simpson says. The true horror of paedophilia was brought into sharp focus with the murder six years ago of Sarah Payne in England. Sarah had left a game of hide-and-seek in her grandparents' West Sussex backyard and never returned home. The eight-year-old who lost her life at the hands of a convicted paedophile became a symbol of all abused children. Her death seemed to confirm to all parents that no child is ever truly safe. Just as Sarah Payne's story lives on as a reminder of the evil that can swoop on any child, her family must live with the knowledge that she met an unfathomable end. "The grief never goes away," said Sarah's grandfather Terry, who still lives in the house near where Sarah went missing. "We've all seen psychiatrists and had counselling, but the pain never leaves us." In the wake of that case, there was a clamour in Britain for the introduction of full public access to the sex offenders' list, in line with the law in the United States. Since 1995, information on sex offenders and their crimes has been public property in more than 40 US states. The system is based on Megan's Law, named after seven-year-old Megan Kanka, who was murdered by a neighbour, a convicted sex offender, in July 1994. Under Megan's Law, police can also take it upon themselves to notify the public. An officer on the beat who "may notice that an individual consistently sits across the street from a park and watches children play . . . can determine if he is a registered sex offender and alert parents in the park". But Megan's Law has its dangers. This year in the US, five people have been murdered by people who have accessed the sex offenders register. A similar spate of vigilantism was sparked in the wake of Sarah Payne's murder, when the News Of the World launched a campaign to 'name and shame' thousands of paedophiles. It printed and put online the names, photographs and believed whereabouts of 49 people, planning to eventually publish information on 110,000 "proven" sex offenders. Many parents feel that full access to a sex offenders' list is preferable to none at all. One Irish mother whose son was sexually abused for years by his remedial teacher is still angry at the fact that the man was a known child sex offender. After a long and traumatic trial at the Central Criminal Court in Dublin, the man was jailed for 10 years. During the trial, it emerged he had been living with a convicted paedophile, and had come to the attention of the gardaí. "When I first went to the guards to complain about a teacher, they mentioned his name before I did. I was horrified. They knew. They knew or at least they had a strong suspicion. Someone in the school must have had an idea as well, yet nobody warned me and they let this man alone for hours with my son. I couldn't believe it," the boy's mother said.
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