A woman has been charged with assisting murderer and paedophile Philip John Smith to flee the country last year.
A 33-year-old woman from Palmerston North had been summonsed to appear in the Auckland District Court on February 24 to face a charge of assisting him to escape lawful custody in November, police said.
The charge falls under Section 121(1)(b) of the Crimes Act and carries a maximum prison sentence of seven years, Auckland city police district commander Superintendent Richard Chambers said.
Smith was caught in Rio de Janeiro on November 13 a week after allegedly fleeing New Zealand while on temporary release from Spring Hill Corrections Facility in South Auckland, where he was serving a life term.
In 1995, he stabbed to death the father of a boy he had been sexually abusing, after tracking the family down to a Wellington house where they had moved to escape him.
