May 10

May 10, 2006: Inspectorate Report On Anthony Rice

A report on the release and supervision of Anthony Rice – convicted of murdering Naomi Bryant in August 2005 while under probation supervision – has been published by the Chief Inspector of Probation Andrew Bridges.

At the time of Ms Bryant's murder, Rice had been released from prison on a life licence after a history of serious sexual attacks including rape, attempted rape and other assaults. He was being supervised in the community by Hampshire Probation Area alongside a number of other agencies through Hampshire Multi-agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA).

The independent report requested by Hampshire MAPPA - identifies a number of substantial deficiencies in the way Rice was managed both before and after his release from prison. The Chief Inspector commented:

"Our conclusion about this case is that there were substantial deficiencies in the way Rice was supervised, but in any case he was too dangerous to be released into the community in the first place. The public is entitled to an explanation about how that happened, and our account has shown that a succession of specific mistakes, misjudgements and miscommunications at all three phases of Rice's life sentence had a compounding effect that amounted to what we have called a cumulative failure."

"This all took place in a climate in which it is increasingly difficult for those charged with managing offenders through their sentences to ensure that public protection considerations are not undermined by the human rights considerations of each case."

The report makes five key recommendations to address the problems found, one of which is that there should be a major appraisal of current policy and practice for releasing prisoners from indeterminate sentences.

The full report including the Chief Inspector's detailed recommendations is available online.

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