Sarah’s Law to be introduced in Sussex
Sarah’s law is set to be introduced in the county in which Sarah Payne was murdered, enabling police to tip off parents about convicted paedophiles.
After four police forces ran successful pilot schemes another 20, including Sussex, which covers Sarah’s home county of West Sussex, are poised to join in.
Under the rules, parents will be able to ask police if an individual in contact with their kids is a known paedophile. If the police think it is in a child’s interest they can provide information confidentially.
It is a watered-down version of US laws where details of paedophiles’ addresses are actively publicised. After Sarah, eight, was murdered by paedophile Roy Whiting in West Sussex in 2000, her mother, Sara Payne, campaigned for a UK equivalent.
The scheme is now set to be rolled out across all England and Wales by March. Olivia Pinkney, assistant chief constable for Sussex, said: “This will enhance child safeguarding procedures in the county.”
A total of 315 requests were made to the four forces in the test scheme, leading to the identification of 21 paedophiles and 11 individuals with convictions for different offences.
Is this law being accepted by sussex police due to there own poor judgement an bad follow through of previous cases towards paedophile’s? Does this mean that sussex police will just rely on parents to keep asking about local paedophile’s? Does this mean Olivia Pinkney’s team are admitting they have failed previous children who have been directly affected by local paedophile’s?