I only saw Maddie on TV says pervert

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15 June 2009
Belfast Telegraph
Tom Moynihan


A convicted British paedophile has insisted he has never seen missing Madeleine McCann other than in posters and on television. Raymond Hewlett, whom detectives working for the McCann family have tried and failed to interview, said: “I’d take a lie detector test. “I’ll take any test you like. The only time I’ve seen Madeleine McCann is on missing posters. And I saw her on TV in a bar once. But I’ve never seen her in real life.”
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Maddy team's bid to quiz paedophile fails

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11 June 2009
Belfast Telegraph
Sam Marsden


Final attempts by private detectives searching for Madeleine McCann to interview a convicted British paedophile about her disappearance have failed. Retired police officers Dave Edgar, who served in Northern Ireland, and Arthur Cowley flew to Germany on Tuesday hoping to speak to Raymond Hewlett, who is said to have been staying an hour's drive from the McCann's Portuguese holiday flat when the little girl vanished. But negotiations between the private investigators and Hewlett's German lawyer broke down yesterday.
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Ex-RUC man in Maddie setback

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11 June 2009
Belfast News Letter


A former RUC detective who is leading the hunt for Madeline McCann failed yesterday in his final attempt to interview a convicted British paedophile about her disappearance. Dave Edgar and his colleague Arthur Cowley flew to Germany to speak to Raymond Hewlett who is said to have been staying an hour's drive from the McCann's Portuguese holiday flat when the little girl vanished. But negotiations between the private investigators and Hewlett's German lawyer broke down.
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Madeleine team want to quiz convicted paedophile

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25 May 2009 
Belfast Telegraph

A convicted paedophile who is being investigated over Madeleine McCann’s disappearance said he was familiar with the layout of the Portuguese holiday complex where she went missing, it has been reported. Raymond Hewlett is alleged to have been staying around an hour’s drive from the McCanns’ holiday flat in Praia da Luz when she vanished on May 3 2007. The McCanns’ investigation team wants to interview the 64-year-old in the next few days in the hope he can shed some light on the little girl’s disappearance.
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FIEND IN THE FRAME

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24 May 2009
The News of the World
BY KEITH GLADDIS

Maddie suspect's Irish past fits crime

A COP who interrogated Madeleine McCann suspect Raymond Hewlett says the case carries all the hallmarks of the sick sex beast who struck in Ireland.

Former Detective Superintendent Trevor Wilkinson spent years on the trail of the convicted paedophile, who was in Portugal when Maddie vanished two years ago.

And Mr Wilkinson told the Irish News of the World the snatching of the child from her holiday apartment matches the predator's offending profile.

He said: "He is constantly looking for prey and we know he is prepared to enter a property to get to a child, which he's done."

Hewlett, 64, critically ill with cancer in a German hospital, has been jailed three times for kidnap and molesting young girls and is connected to a string of other attacks on kids.

In 1998 the Irish News of the World found him in an isolated cottage in the remote Cooley mountains in Co Louth. Schoolkids would visit his home where he pretended to be a maths teacher who could help with homework.

He was forced out of Dunaff, Co Donegal, moved near Tralee, Co Kerry, and has spent time in Dublin, Kildare, Laois, Wesmeath, Fermanagh, and Tyrone.

Detectives hired by Kate and Gerry McCann hope to quiz the pervert this week.

They plan to grill him about his whereabouts when Maddie went missing and about other paedos in Portugal. Ex-detective Dave Edgar and his team have just gathered new information in the Algarve.
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Former PSNI chief Cramphorn dies

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30 November 2006
Former acting PSNI Chief Constable Colin Cramphorn has died.
BBC News

The police officer, who was deputy chief constable of the RUC, had been West Yorkshire's chief constable for the past four years. He died after a lengthy battle with cancer. Mr Cramphorn, 50 was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2004.
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FREED.. the PREDATOR

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7 September 2003
The Sunday Mirror
By AMANDA REVELL WALTON

EXCLUSIVE How many more times will this man be let out of prison to attack women?

A SEX assault victim was last night horrified to learn that the serial offender who attacked her has been set free early - for the THIRD time.

Gregory Beach, 33, was released after only two years and five months despite the fact that he reoffended twice before when freed.

Beach broke into Claire Murray's house, dragged her into her garden and subjected her to a sickening indecent assault.

At the time he was living in a bail hostel after being freed from prison where he had been serving his second term behind bars for sex attacks on women. Now he is out for a third time, living on a housing estate packed with young families and wandering unsupervised around local shops.

When Beach was jailed for attacking Claire, an expert's report damned him as "a habitual sexual offender simply unable to control his deviant urges".

Despite this he was released early after serving just over half of his four-year sentence.

Because of loopholes in the law and lax sentencing he is once more on the loose - sparking fury among campaigners and MPs.

The outcry comes after pervert James Taylor was jailed for just five years this week for the rape of a baby girl.

Reliving the night Beach attacked her, Claire, 25, told the Sunday Mirror: "I went to the kitchen and I saw this man going towards the back door.

"I was rooted to the spot in fear. He grabbed me and started kissing me and tried to get my clothes off.

"He was pulling my knickers down and put his hand over my mouth. I was thinking, 'I can't escape, it's going to happen, he's going to rape me'.

"I could feel myself giving up as he got me out the back door.

"I had one last try at getting away. Somehow I managed it. He would have raped me if I hadn't."

Claire, whose name we have changed to protect her anonymity, said: "I can't understand why he has been let out early again. I feel totally and utterly betrayed."

Beach struck at Claire's home in Oxford on October 15, 2000 and was jailed in March, 2001, for four years for the indecent assault.

He was freed a fortnight ago with time off for good behaviour.

Before attacking Claire, Beach had been released from jail in December, 1998. He was three years and seven months into a six-year jail term for a sex attack on a nanny.

The nanny, who we are naming only as Michelle, was attacked two days before Christmas in 1994.

Beach told her he had a knife and forced her twice to perform oral sex on him - in front of the two-year-old child she was caring for. Half-way through the ordeal, Michelle, 26 at the time, was physically sick. Yet still Beach persisted and Michelle was sick again. Only the return of the child's parents spared her being raped.

On his release from prison for this attack, Beach was sent to a probation hostel 100 yards from Claire's house.

Claire said: "I never even knew it was there. It sends shivers down my spine to think about it.

"After what that woman went through it just beggars belief that he was able to break into my house and attack me, too."

But even Michelle was not Beach's first victim.

He had repeatedly cornered women in lifts or in dark corners after following them home.

Then, in August 1987, 17-year-old Beach pleaded guilty to five indecent assaults on five women living on the same council estate as him in Battersea, South West London.

He was sentenced to three years in youth custody. He was set free just a year later.

Now, released from Bullingdon Jail in Oxfordshire, he has been housed in yet another hostel in yet another residential area.

The Sunday Mirror is aware of the location. For the last two weeks our reporters have watched as Beach wanders the neighbourhood unchecked. No one at the hostel knows where he is going and as long as he is back for the 11pm curfew no questions are asked. His room at the hostel looks out on to green space where children play football and ride their bikes. Beach has been on sex offender treatment programmes, but a report by forensic psychologist Andrew Bates says he has not changed. The report to the judge who dealt with Beach's last offence says: "Mr Beach is simply unable to control his deviant urges and does not respond to the treatment that is offered him."

It adds: "He is an intelligent man who had learned the methods of avoiding re-offence but simply has chosen not to apply them. I am unable to make any recommendations as he is simply unable to control his deviant urges."

It also says: "Working on deviant sexual fantasies requires very strong commitment on the part of the offender and this would not seem to be present in this case. Mr Beach's dysfunctional response to stress is to sexually fantasise and then offend sexually and this is what he chose to do..." A prison source said: "Beach has had more treatment this time, but no one is convinced. He is still a risk to every woman."

During his last spell in prison Beach pulled out of a treatment programme after 10 months.

The source added: "It is a worrying situation. The truth is that no woman is safe while he's out there."

At present, there is no law to stop untreatable sex offenders being released after serving as much of their sentence as ordinary prisoners - normally half if they behave well. Which is why men like Paul Roson, Raymond Hewlett and Graham Rankine - on the right-were allowed out to re-offend.

Legislation going through Parliament will enable sex offenders to be kept in jail indefinitely if thought to be a danger to the public. But former Shadow Home Secretary Ann Widdecombe said: "There is nothing at all wrong with the law but a lot wrong with the way it is being implemented."

Norman Brennan, of the Victims of Crime Trust, said: "The maximum sentence for indecent assault is 10 years. Isn't it time some of these people were given higher sentences?"

And Sue Griffiths, of charity Rape Crisis, said: "Our judges are not rooted in this world. Beach should definitely still be behind bars."

The outcry comes amid the row over baby rapist Taylor, 43, of Falkirk, Stirlingshire, who took photographs of himself in the act.

Judge Lord Reed refused to comment on the lenient sentence. But Scotland's top law official, Lord Advocate Colin Boyd QC, has ordered a report into the case.

AUG 1987
JAILED

Three years in youth custody for sex attacks on five women

AUG 1988
FREED

after 12 months

MAY 1995
JAILED

Six years for sex assault on nanny in front of child, aged 2

DEC 1998
FREED

after 43 months

MAR 2001
JAILED

Four years for indecently assaulting a woman at home

AUG 2003
FREED

after 32 months

NEXT?

FREED TO REOFFEND

1

PAUL ROBSON, 37

PERVERT Robson has been sent to prison three times for a string of horrific sex attacks. Each time he has been allowed back into the community he has committed more crimes on women and children.

Robson, also known as Tony Swift, was first sent to jail for sex attacks on two girls aged 11 and 12. He was sentenced to four years in prison. But just four months after his release in 1990, he abducted and sexually assaulted an eight-year-old girl in Morecambe, Lancs.

Robson was then sentenced to eight years for abduction and assault. He was released in September 1996, and in June 1997 he was jailed for five years for falsely imprisoning a 34-year-old woman.

He was released just three years into his sentence in February 2000, despite begging to be kept in jail.

Two weeks later, he struck again, breaking into a young woman's home before tying her up and subjecting her to a sexual attack at knifepoint.

He was arrested two days later, and in August 2000 was given two life sentences at Oxford Crown Court for two charges of attempted rape and two of indecent assault. He could be paroled nine years into his sentence.

2

RAYMOND HEWLETT, 58

SICK Hewlett remains at large despite committing a string of attacks against women and children.

Hewlett, 58, first struck in 1972 when he lured his neighbour's 12-year-old daughter into his car, knocked her out with paint thinner and raped her.

He was sentenced to 18 months' jail at Leeds Crown Court in 1973, but served just 12.

In 1978 he attempted to rape a girl of 14, holding a gun to her head, and was jailed for four years.

After serving 16 months, he was allowed out yet again. On New Year's Day, 1988, Hewlett kidnapped and indecently assaulted a 14-year-old girl on her paper round.He was jailed for six years at Mold Crown Court.

Hewlett was granted home leave from Stoken Prison, Leicestershire, in 1990, but absconded. He was arrested in 1991 and was jailed.

In 1992 he was released and questioned over the murder of schoolgirl Lesley Molseed.

He was bailed to reappear at the police station in February, 1993, but fled to Ireland.

Charges were dropped and police have lost track of him. He is wanted for questioning over various child abductions.

3

GRAHAM RANKINE, 45

EVIL Rankine was finally given two life sentences in May 2000 after a lifelong campaign of hate against women.

Rankine was 18 when he was first arrested for having unlawful sex with a girl of 13 at a hotel.

In 1976, while on bail for that offence, he carried out his first rape - on a 16-year-old girl.

Six weeks later he attacked another girl, this time aged 17.

For all three offences he was sent to borstal for just six months.

When released, Rankine held an 18-year-old virgin hostage in his Southampton bedsit for hours and subjected her to an horrific rape.

He was remanded in custody by magistrates only to strike again three months later...after being granted bail by a judge.

This time his victim was a 17-year-old girl, who he raped in the same bedsit. He was given a life sentence in 1989.

In 1999 he was released on licence after just 10 years - and almost immediately raped a 30-year-old Oxford University lecturer.

During the attack he repeatedly smashed her head against a wall as she begged for mercy.
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HUNT FOR RUNAWAY PAEDO IN IRELAND

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18 December 2001
Mirror
By NIALL MOONAN


Brit pervert poses risk

ONE of Britain's most dangerous paedophiles is being hunted in Ireland, it was revealed yesterday.

Vicious sex offender Raymond Hewlett, 56, is on the run from English police and Irish authorities have been told he is hiding here.

In the past Hewlett, who sedates his victims before sexually assaulting them, has fled to Ireland to escape the British authorities and they believe he may now be back.

Hewlett is a suspect in the savage sex murder of 11-year-old Lesley Molseed in Rochdale in 1975 and Gardai have revealed he still poses a serious danger to children.

A Garda source said: "This man is dangerous and should not be approached. We have been working closely with colleagues in Britain to track him down.

"We have a file on him and obviously it's in everyone's interests to find him given his past record."

Hewlett, originally from Blackpool in Lancashire, has also been investigated over possible links with several women who went missing in Leinster.

But Operation Trace, the Garda squad set up to investigate the disappearances, could find no connection between him and any of the cases.

Hewlett's connections with Ireland date back to 1997 when he was spotted cruising remote areas in a van.

He also claimed social welfare benefits in Kinsale, Co Cork, Dundalk, Co Louth, Sligo and Letterkenny, Dunfanaghy and Buncrana, Co Donegal.

Hewlett has convictions for rape and sex assaults and is considered to be a serious danger especially to young girls.

One Garda revealed: "Hewlett poses as an undercover police officer to search young girls or befriends their family to gain access to their children."

Hewlett is 5ft 8ins, of stocky build, has blue/green eyes, is balding at the front and has a prominent upper lip.

He also has "Sue" tattooed on his left wrist. Anyone who may have seen him is asked to contact Gardai on 1800 666 111.
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Police want you to help trap these paedophiles

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Now tell us Sarah's Law won't work;
For Sarah; NOW campaign against paedophiles
Peter Rose
16 December 2001
The News of the World

Anyone with information should contact police on 0808 1000040 or 020 7230 3104

THESE are the faces of seven child-sex fiends all prowling the streets of Britain.

Any one of them could be a potential Roy Whiting, yet the police have no idea where almost all of them are.

Scotland Yard called in the News of the World and asked us to publish the pictures in the hope that readers will recognise them.

It demonstrates more clearly than ever before that senior police officers TRUST the public to behave responsibly when given controlled access to information about paedophiles in their midst.

Yet politicians publicly insist that Sarah's Law won't work!

Controlled access is at the core of Sarah's Law, demanded by the News of the World and the overwhelming majority of the nation since Sarah Payne's murdered body was discovered.

Detective Chief Inspector Bob McLachlan, of the Yard's paedophile unit, told the News of the World: "We've taken this unusual step of releasing photos of known sex offenders in a bid to trace them. They've all been convicted of sex offences against children and are considered dangerous.

"They've since been released from prison but have breached the Sex Offenders Act by signing on the sex offenders register but not telling us their whereabouts.

"I want people to be vigilant, not vigilante."

Also, attacks will only harm our For Sarah campaign. Just call one of the telephone numbers at the foot of Page 3 and police will be on the scene in minutes.

The decision to release the pictures of those men under the Met's jurisdiction was endorsed by Deputy Assistant Commissioner Carol Howlett, who is the lead officer on sex offenders for the Association of Chief Police Officers.

These are the wanted men:

WARWICK SPINKS. Aged 37. Dubbed the Pied Piper of Paedophiles, Spinks has roamed the globe using a fake identity since breaking parole in 1997.

Evil In 1995 he was convicted of drugging and kidnapping a 14-year-old boy and selling him to a gay brothel in Amsterdam.

Earlier this year we tracked Spinks to the Canary Islands. He may now be back in Britain.

DCI McLachlan said: "He is a dangerous, evil man and no child is safe while he is at large. The children of this country have the right to be protected."

RAYMOND PERKINS. Aged 62. Convicted in 1969 at Brentford Magistrates Court of indecently assaulting a 13-year-old boy by tying him to a post and removing his clothes. Perkins pleaded guilty and got just three years' probation.

In May 1989 he was convicted of indecently assaulting an eight-year-old boy. This time he was jailed for nine months.

But in August 1997, he was convicted on counts of gross indecency and indecent assault.

In April 1998 police went to his east London address and found him with three boys. Perkins was in breach of his licence conditions and recalled to prison.

He was released again in November 1998 and directed to a London bail hostel. Has been missing since August 1999. Considered a high-risk sex offender.

DAVID BARON. Aged 62. Walks with a slight stoop and has a tattoo on his left arm saying 'Sahara 1961 Foreign Legion'. Speaks fluent French. In 1998 he was convicted of 27 charges of possessing indecent images of children and was jailed for two months.

Two thousand pictures of children under 16 were found. Baron served his sentence at HM Prison Wandsworth but was released in January 1999. Baron's last known address was in west London.

ZIA ASAD ALOWI. Aged 33. Convicted in November 1997 at the Old Bailey and jailed for five years for one count of rape and five counts of indecent assault on a 13-year-old girl. Released in October last year to a bail hostel in Camberwell, south London. Left there the following month.

TUAN QUANG HO. Aged 25. Vietnamese. Arrested in December 1996 for indecently assaulting a 14-year-old girl after getting her drunk. Convicted in May 1997 at Kingston Crown Court on two counts of indecent assault.

Received 14 months detention in Feltham young offenders' institution. Released in December 1997 and initially registered an address in south-east London. In October 2000 he was still there. But he appears to have left in May this year.

RAYMOND HEWLETT. Age 56. Release of his picture was sanctioned by the West Yorkshire force. He is one of a number of suspects being sought by them over the 1975 sex murder of 11-year-old Lesley Molseed in Rochdale, Lancs.

Detective Chief Superintendent Max McLean, who keeps a photo of Lesley on his desk, opened 148 new lines of inquiry into her murder as a result of our dossier.

A West Yorkshire Police spokesman confirmed last night it would be useful for the News of the World to publish a photograph of Raymond Hewlett, saying he is still missing.

The spokesman said: "I've spoken to DCI Max McLean this morning and he says yes it would. He's still one of a number of suspects we are trying to trace. We'd welcome anything that helps."

Hewlett has a string of convictions for abducting and raping young girls and has served long stretches in jail. He was last thought to be working on trawlers under another identity.

WILFRED THELLMANN. Aged 45. The only man on this list whose whereabouts are known by the police. But the Met force have unusally sanctioned using his picture to let people know of his existence.

The father of two walked free from Wandsworth prison after serving his last sentence. Originally from Long Eaton in Nottinghamshire, he has convictions for indecent assaults on young girls and taking indecent photos which date back over the last 16 years.

One police source said: "There is no doubt he is a danger to children and will go on to offend again."

Turn to Page 10 for more information on paedophiles in your area.
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200 Sex monsters prowling in Ireland

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3 June 2001
People
Jason Johnson


GARDAI fear there are up to 200 serious sex offenders roaming free in Ireland - and they have no way of wiping out the massive risk of them re-offending. Among the rag-bag of sickos are child sex offenders and serial rapists who have shattered hundreds of young lives between them.
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Police alarm as paedophiles seek refuge in Ireland

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18 August 2000
The Independent
By Cahal Milmo


Sex offenders: Vigilantes have driven high-risk abusers across the Irish Sea, where the authorities fear they may strike again


Protests in Britain have provoked an exodus of sex offenders who believe they can find a haven from vigilantes in Ireland, Irish police said yesterday.

They believe a dozen British child abusers - including two considered "high-risk" paedophiles by the UK authorities - have secretly entered Ireland.

The men are feared to have gone to ground across Ireland, where there are no passport controls and no sex offenders' register. Child protection experts said the paedophiles believe they can evade detection.

There is increasing evidence that the violence which followed the name-and-shame campaign by the News of the World is forcing some sex offenders to seek isolated hideaways after one abuser, Thomas Maxwell, escaped jail because he was living in "voluntary exile" in the Hebrides.

Residents in the village of Leverburgh, on Harris in the Western Isles, last night vowed to campaign to force out the 60-year-old, who has gone into hiding and failed to contact his probation authority.

In Ireland, surveillance at ports and airports has been stepped up after officers received tip-offs from British police that paedophiles from their areas were heading across the Irish Sea.

One offender, a 36-year-old Birmingham man convicted of offences against young boys, was arrested at Dublin airport last week as he tried to enter and ordered to return to the UK.

But Irish police admitted that others running scared of protests in places such as Portsmouth and Manchester have managed to gain clandestine entry and present a risk of further offending.

Brendan Costello, spokesman at the police headquarters in Dublin, said: "Paedophiles coming from Britain to Ireland are slipping through the net. The numbers are not huge but they have increased since the protests. It is impossible for us to monitor every individual coming into Ireland from Britain and the risk is that they may offend again."

The police said 80 per cent of known paedophiles entering Ireland were being monitored, thanks to tip-offs from British police and information from residents where offenders settle.

But a Dublin police source added: "The system is far from ideal because we are reliant on word of mouth from our opposite numbers in Britain and historically there has been little monitoring of paedophiles here. We think there are around a dozen men who have stolen their way in over the last few weeks and feel they are safe from detection. Until or unless they commit crimes again, that is probably true."

Detectives have drawn up a list of paedophiles in an attempt to track down the most dangerous individuals at large.

One serial sex offender, Raymond Hewlett, 55, is in hiding after disappearing from an isolated cottage in Carlingford, Co Louth, in the north-east of the country last year.


The father-of-eight, who has convictions for kidnapping and raping or molesting four young girls in England, is wanted for questioning in connection with a series of attempted abductions in the republic.


Hewlett was also the main suspect for the murder 25 years ago of 11-year-old Lesley Molseed on the Yorkshire Moors. In one of the most high-profile miscarriages of justice, Stefan Kiszko was jailed for life and served 16 years before his conviction was quashed in 1992. He died a year later.


Hewlett was arrested on suspicion of killing Lesley after his release from a separate prison sentence in 1993. He was eventually freed through a lack of evidence.

Officials at the National Criminal Intelligence Service in London, which keeps a list of around 300 British high-risk itinerant paedophiles, said they were aware of offenders heading for Ireland. It is understood two child abusers on the NCIS serious sexual offenders' database have crossed the Irish Sea in the past month. Their details have been passed to the police.

Child protection experts warned that signals from the British government that stricter sentencing could be introduced for paedophiles will drive more offenders overseas.

An Irish sex offenders' register, similar to that in Britain, will not come into force until end of the year, welfare workers said.

Paul Gilligan, chief executive of the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, said: "The name-and-shame campaign in Britain has made Ireland an attractive option for British paedophiles. The evidence is strong from police officers and social workers that some abusers have already come into the country and gone to ground. There is a definite perception that Ireland is a haven for their kind."

Ireland's Sex Offenders Bill 2000 will require those with convictions for sex crimes to register with the police when they arrive. But campaigners say the Bill does not go far enough in providing public access to information. It will also include only those convicted of offences after it comes into force.

In Scotland, community leaders among the 400 people in Leverburgh vowed that their village would not become a paedophile haven after Thomas Maxwell was found to be living in their midst. This week, the blacksmith escaped prison for sexual offences against a 12-year-old girl in Alloa but went into hiding in Stornoway on Lewis when his conviction became public knowledge.

John Mitchell, chairman of the South Harris Community Council, said: "We have a system where living in this village is deemed a punishment equivalent to prison. We will not stop until this man has left."

Neil Galbraith, chief executive of the Western Isles Council, the probation authority responsible for Maxwell, said: "He has not been in touch. We do not know whether he intends to stay or where he is. The effects of the publicity about him are clear to see."
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Murder quiz 24 years on

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20 March 1999
The Sun


A MAN suspected of murdering an 11-year-old girl 24 years ago could face trial after her family launched a private prosecution bid.

Lesley Molseed's relatives asked lawyers to bring the action against convicted paedophile Raymond Hewlett, 54.

The girl's body was found on moors near her home in Rochdale, Lancs. She had been stabbed and sexually assaulted.

Local man Hewlett, now thought to be in Ireland, was named as prime suspect in a book which told how clerk Stefan Kiszko served 16 years in jail after being wrongly convicted of Lesley's murder. Hewlett has been quizzed by cops but maintained his innocence.
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Molseed family tries for private prosecution

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20 March 1999
Yorkshire Post
Andrew Vine, Chief Reporter


The family of murdered child Lesley Molseed are to launch a private prosecution against the convicted paedophile they believe killed her - 24 years after her body was found and six years after the man wrongfully jailed for the crime died.

Relatives of Lesley - found stabbed on moors near Halifax in 1975 three days after she disappeared from her Rochdale home - have instructed solicitors to bring an action against Raymond Hewlett, 54, who is now living in Ireland.

Hewlett was living in Rochdale at the time of Lesley's murder and has a string of convictions for violent offences against children. He was questioned about the murder twice, and offered an alibi in which he claimed to have been with a 15-year-old girl at the time Lesley was killed. The girl later said he had been lying. In 1992, the Crown Prosecution Service decided there was insufficient evidence to bring charges.

Lesley's family are determined that Hewlett faces a court, especially since the death six years ago of Stefan Kiszko, the man wrongfully jailed for the murder, who spent 16 years behind bars.

Lesley's parents, April Garrett and Fred Anderson, her sister Julie Anderson and brother Fred junior have instructed Manchester solicitor Robert Lizar to start a private prosecution.

Mr Lizar, who specialises in miscarriages of justice, is seeking access to West Yorkshire Police files on the murder inquiry.

He said: "I am not sure why the Crown Prosecution never decided to go ahead with the case against Hewlett as we have not yet had access to all the information they had."

Julie Anderson said: "Nobody else is doing anything for us and no one seems likely to bring Hewlett to trial. We thought that something had to be done."

A spokeswoman for West Yorkshire Police said the file on Lesley's murder was still open.

A book on the case which named Hewlett as a prime suspect had offered no new evidence, she added.

Hewlett left Rochdale for Ireland the day after Lesley disappeared. When he returned a month later, police questioned him about her murder during a trawl of known child abusers. He said he had been in Todmorden with a 15-year-old girl. Twenty years later, that girl was tracked down by police in Australia, and she told them Hewlett had not been with her.

Three years after Lesley was killed, Hewlett was jailed for four years for forcing a 14-year-old girl to undress at gunpoint in her Todmorden home. He served 16 months of the sentence before he escaped and fled to Ireland. In 1989, after kidnapping a 14-year-old girl and sexually assaulting her at knifepoint, he was captured and sentenced to six years.

Stefan Kiszko was jailed for the murder of Lesley after confessing to the crime while under arrest. He later withdrew that confession. He died aged 41 just 18 months after being cleared of the murder and freed from jail.
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Town not told of paedophile's stay

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12 October 1997
The Sunday Times
By Jan Battles and Maeve Sheehan


A RURAL community in Co Kerry is outraged at the gardai's failure to warn them about a suspected child-killer and convicted paedophile who stayed in a local hostel.

Raymond Hewlett, 52, an Englishman suspected of murdering 12-year-old Lesley Molseed in Yorkshire 22 years ago, has been living in Ireland for several months.

The paedophile arrived at Dromtacker, a quiet suburb one mile from Tralee, 11 days ago. Hewlett and his 21-year-old German girlfriend, Marianne Schumucker, checked into the Little River hostel for two nights. But he fled the hostel last Saturday after learning that gardai had called to make inquires about him.

Hewlett, who has a string of convictions for assaults on young girls, was in close proximity to children during his stay in Dromtacker. The hostel is in a cluster of bungalows, many housing young families.

Local people said this weekend that the gardai should have warned them that a paedophile was staying in the area. One local woman said she and her neighbours were unaware that the "very chatty" man who had stayed in a tent in front of the local hostel was a convicted paedophile.

She said Hewlett was often seen chatting up 19 and 20-year-old girls, asking them about younger members of their family. "I think the gardai should have told us, so we could mind our children," said one woman.

Hewlett and his girlfriend arrived in Kerry from Donegal, where they had lived for several months. The couple left when they became aware that they were being monitored by detectives.

Local gardai notified their colleagues in Kerry in early October when they learned that the paedophile planned to move there.

Two detectives called to the Little River hostel last weekend to check on Hewlett. The paedophile and his girlfriend left suddenly last Saturday morning.

Gardai believe that Hewlett intended to stay in Dromtacker for some time. In his two days there, he had signed on at the local unemployment exchange.

Hewlett's record is outlined in a circular distributed to garda stations in the southwest. It warns that Hewlett is a danger to children and should be kept under observation.

In 1972 Hewlett lured his neighbour's 10-year-old daughter into his car, knocked her out with paint thinner and raped her. He later ordered another young girl to strip at gunpoint.

He was jailed for six years in 1988 for kidnapping at knifepoint a 14-year-old girl, whom he dumped in woodland 100 miles away after unsuccessfully trying to rape her.

A new book by Trevor Wilkinson, a retired British police chief, claims that Hewlett should have been brought to trial for the killing of Lesley Molseed in 1975. Molseed's mutilated body was found on the moors 10 miles from her home in Rochdale.

Stefan Kiszko was wrongly convicted and served 16 years for Molseed's murder. A subsequent investigation, which cleared Kiszko, pinpointed Hewlett as the child's killer.
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LAIR OF A SEX FIEND

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6 October 1997
Mirror


A sex fiend who is on the British government's paedophile register is hiding out in Co Donegal.

Raymond Hewlett is named in a new book by retired British police chief Trevor Wilkinson as the killer of a 12-year-old Lesley Molseed.

Her body was found battered and stabbed in Yorkshire 22 years ago.

Hewlett is now living in a cottage with a 21-year-old girl, claiming social security benefits and doing odd jobs.

Gardai in Donegal revealed they have been closely monitoring Hewlett's movements.
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