Child abuse suspect roamed free with no tag... for six months

A SUSPECTED child sex offender avoided being fitted with an electronic tag for more than six months because a controversial IT system collapsed, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

The suspect, who was also accused of kidnapping, was one of 35 people either convicted or awaiting trial for serious offences who were left to roam free when a £300million digital case management system failed to send notifications to criminal justice agencies.

It is the latest calamity to befall the controversial Common Platform system that has allegedly been losing and altering case records, causing chaos at a time when criminal courts are battling record delays.

Last year, officials at the Public and Commercial Services Union, whose members include legal advisers and clerks at magistrates’ courts, said the system was ‘so flawed that it’s almost like it’s got a mind of its own’.

In the latest glitch, more than 300 unsent messages were found to have potentially ‘affected justice outcomes’.

A National Audit Office (NAO) report said: ‘In 35 cases an individual was not fitted with an electronic monitoring tag when they should have been.’

In addition to the suspected child sex offender, one person charged with manslaughter was left untagged for 36 days.

Others, variously facing trial for sexual assault, grievous bodily harm and stalking involving fear of violence, all escaped tagging for a month or more.

Separately, one person convicted of threatening behaviour and intentional harassment was untagged for 84 days.

Another, convicted of assaulting an emergency worker and carrying a knife, was left untagged for 15 days.

The problem lasted from June 2021 to August last year. HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) had to pause the rollout of the software for two weeks while the problems were investigated.

‘The system could not cope with the volume of notifications,’ said the NAO report. ‘HMCTS has since completed an extended review, which has recommended that it works with partners to identify a more robust mechanism for exchanging data rather than the current email route.’

The NAO said the system had been introduced ‘before it was ready’, creating ‘extra burdens for courts when they were already under pressure’.

Gareth Davies, head of the NAO, said the Common Platform debacle had ‘put avoidable pressure on the courts at a critical time’.

He added the HMCTS must also ‘secure value for money from the £1.3billion [of public money] it has invested’.

The Ministry of Justice said: ‘No offences were reported by the 35 defendants who were temporarily untagged.’

Last month’s NAO report said the Common Platform is unpopular with staff. As a result it has been ‘causing stress’ and is sometimes seen as ‘interfering with the smooth running of live court cases’.

A legal adviser who quit over Common Platform issues, having worked for more than 20 years in the court system, told The Mail on Sunday: ‘The rollout was a disaster.

‘The main issue was that trial results would simply vanish off the system. This is completely unacceptable. This is a problem when people have orders made against them, such as not contacting people.

‘For a while there was a nationwide error, whereby everyone who was remanded was automatically made a suicide risk – which is a pain for prison staff, and expensive.

‘Because things we would input, such as results or orders against people, would disappear, or the system would freeze and lose the information that had been inputted, we’d have to start again.

‘So what emerged from the NAO report does not surprise me at all.

‘I’d venture what the report found is merely the tip of the iceberg – and it will continue causing similar issues, which will put public safety at risk.’

‘It’s unacceptable, the system was a disaster’