Youth placed in school lures girl, 8, and rapes her

A youth known to be the subject of sexual misconduct allegations raped an 8-year-old Christchurch girl after the Corrections Department placed him at her school.

Corrections confirmed yesterday that it was aware of historic allegations of sexually inappropriate behaviour when the offender was sentenced to community work.
He was placed at the Christchurch school in April after being convicted on a theft charge.

The 17-year-old went on to rape the 8-year-old after taking her and her 12-year-old brother to a neighbourhood playground out of school hours.

He was charged over that sex attack and also faced a sexual count involving the brother, but this was later dropped by police.

Last month, he was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison.

Community Probation Service southern regional manager Paul Tomlinson confirmed that the department was aware of historic sexual allegations before placing the offender in the school but the youth had no convictions for sexual offences.

"The information about these allegations was not passed to those responsible for managing his community work sentence at the beginning of his sentence," Mr Tomlinson said. "The Christchurch area manager has since changed procedures to improve communication between staff.

"The department is very concerned about what happened and has expressed its regret to the family."

The children's mother is furious the offender was allowed to come near her children.

"It just is passed from one agency to another. I've had a gutsful at this stage. I feel like I want to buy a gun and shoot everybody."

The family are still trying to cope with the horror of the sexual abuse and are struggling to get counselling assistance for the children.

Further trouble for the family began when the offender claimed while being interviewed by police that the siblings had been involved in sexual activity in the past.

The mother said Child, Youth and Family, acting on the claims, removed the boy from his home just days after the abuse.

"We were just devastated. We knew it wasn't true and the police knew that it wasn't true but CYF came in," she said.

The boy was eventually allowed to return home.

- NZPA