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Mystery surrounds leaflet drop outside primary school
Poppleton Road Primary School
Poppleton Road Primary School

A HEAD teacher has sought to reassure parents that their children are safe after a mystery man handed out leaflets, claiming a paedophile was staying at a nearby probation hostel.

Sue Eland, head of Poppleton Road Primary School, which is situated just along the road from Southview Hostel, has now written to parents and carers to try and diffuse the situation.

She said the claim may or may not be true, and the school had no information on the matter, but she was aware the leaflet had caused anxiety among a number of parents.

Mrs Eland said anyone with serious concerns about the flyer and the information contained on it should phone the police's public protection unit on 0845 60 60 247.

In the letter to parents, Ms Eland said: "Can I reassure parents and carers that all individual offenders at the hostel are under constant surveillance and monitored by public protection officers.

"Poppleton Road Community Primary School is a safe place for your children to attend and the school has a good relationship with Southview Hostel, whose managers work alongside us in maintaining a safe and secure environment for your child.

"We have 24-hour surveillance of our building and are always vigilant of your children while at school."

The hostel hit the headlines last year after it emerged a dangerous child sex offender - Joseph Taylor - had absconded, leading to a police search. Taylor eventually handed himself in at York Station.

Sue Eland
Sue Eland

A grandparent of a child at Poppleton Road School, who wanted to remain anonymous, contacted The Press about the leaflet. He said if the allegations in the flyer turned out to be true, he feared the paedophile might offend.

He said: "Let's not tempt fate. I want to protect my grandchildren and all other children from this evil scum."

He alleged the head teacher had asked the man who was handing out the leaflets to move on. When he did not, she contacted the police.

But the grandfather said he believed the public should know if a paedophile was living in their communit. He said: "He (the man handing out the leaflets) was not doing any harm and I think he was doing right."

A spokesman for the police said they could not comment on individual cases but that "suitable advice and reassurance has been given to all parties involved".

Mike Ryan, assistant chief officer of North Yorkshire Probation Service, also said he could not comment about individual cases.

But he said: "The Southview approved premises is the best option for the management of risk of a broad range of offenders and, where necessary and appropriate, this would be at the direction of multi-agency public protection arrangements.

"This means that in respect of managing offenders, all agencies are fully aware of the risks that any individual may pose and how best to manage those risks."

A spokeswoman for City of York Council, speaking on behalf of the school, said a number of parents had contacted the school to say they had been reassured by Ms Eland's letter.

10:02am Tuesday 6th May 2008

   

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Posted by: petethefeet, York on 10:49am Tue 6 May 08
North Yorkshire Probabtion services bought Southview in 1993 as part of a national drive to purchase hotels prior to a change in the legislation that would prevent them from simply buying hotels and operating them as bail hostels. In those days, they argued that they were "not providing Care" and therefore could use a building that had hotel planning status. Since then, the law has changed and they would now have to go through "change of use", something which I doubt they would get at Southview. Unfortunately, existing hostels, and that includes SouthView, automatically picked up the new status and by this "twist" they are now allowed to house other residents other than bailee's.

The saga of how SouthView has become a rehabilitation centre, that certainly does provide "Care" represents a gross abuse of the legal system on behalf of the Probation Services nationally. They do an essential service but they also seem to have a total disregard of the effect that they have on the community. They need a totally new management.
Posted by: franky, york on 10:54am Tue 6 May 08
Whoever handed out the flier sounds like a nutter who caused more harm and fear than is merited through their own actions!
Posted by: petethefeet, York on 11:06am Tue 6 May 08
Franky. Normally I would agree with you but I have detailed knowledge of how the Probation Service operated in the period when Southview was purchased and I don't believe that they are deserving of the public trust. In short, they reap what they sow!
Posted by: tickety boo, york on 11:13am Tue 6 May 08
well i wouldnt call the person responsible a nutter they obviously felt they have good cause to hand the leaflets out and as a parent of a small child at this school i feel we should know such things in order to make informed choices on our childrens safety. If it is true it wouldnnt surprise me i think we have been lied to about this hostel all along we were told that nobody whos considered a danger to children would be housed there but they would say that wouldnt they
Posted by: only human, huntington on 11:33am Tue 6 May 08
The daughter of a friend of mine was befriended by a scumbag registered sex offender housed at this place 3 years ago.He and some of his cronies hung around a local comprehensive school and picked their vulnerable targets.
The girl was just 15 going on 16 when she met him and was unaware of his past and the implications.Once he had her hooked with his charms she began a sexual ralationship with him.
Her parents found out and tried to seek help from the authorities.
No-one listened and the girl became pregnant to him,the parents begged her to dump him as they discovered he was a convicted sex offender living in the hostel on licence following a sentence for attempted rape of a 17 year old in Cramlington.
Instead of helping the parents to protect their vulnerable daughter the authorities housed the girl and the beast in bed and breakfast and then a bedsit in ordnance lane.
It was only after the animal hit the girl whilst she was 6 months pregnant that she finally agreed to go back to her parents.
Now she is a single parent living with mum and dad.
He has moved on to his next victim who is currently expecting a baby.
These predators should be sent to a deserted island of single sex people of similar calibre and left to their own devices.Hopefully they will die alone and go to hell.
Posted by: lastword morris, Haxby Rd on 11:42am Tue 6 May 08
Why are we **** footing about???
Have a MASSIVE campaign, a blitz...so as everybody knows. Say as from -----(date)..It is absoultely not acceptable to sexually abuse a child..after this date any person who does so will be castrated...AND DO IT!!!..The few days advertising the fact can be used to train the huge number of volunteers ready to do the job!!!!!!!problem solved...
Posted by: petethefeet, York on 11:45am Tue 6 May 08
Only-human hints at another STUPID aspect of English law. Parents are supposedly responsible for under 18's but the law doesn't compel those over 16 to comply with their parents. Accordingly, they can legally move out of the parental home without the parents consent.
These people, i.e. the Probation Services, seem to be overun by Christianised do-gooders that have a mind-block to the harm that their charges have on society. Even if the fear of the place is over-exaggerated then people are allowed their reasonable fears. Every day, hundreds of mothers have to walk by the gold-fish bowl that is Southview with their young children, in dull view of the inmates looking on. I'm afraid I'm full of loathing for both the inmates and the probation services.
Posted by: franky, york on 12:59pm Tue 6 May 08
petethefeet wrote:
Franky. Normally I would agree with you but I have detailed knowledge of how the Probation Service operated in the period when Southview was purchased and I don't believe that they are deserving of the public trust. In short, they reap what they sow!
Fair enough.

I just don't think it warrants uninformed vigilante action like leafleting when there are no facts established, and the school is unaware.

I detest pedophiles like everyone else, but reviewing/examining the whole system for hostels like this is one thing, and very different to one parent waging a solo fight, and getting people concerned about what could be a bogus case.
Posted by: Bemused, York on 1:14pm Tue 6 May 08
A spokesman for the police said they could not comment on individual cases but that "suitable advice and reassurance has been given to all parties involved".
Mike Ryan, assistant chief officer of North Yorkshire Probation Service, also said he could not comment about individual cases.

So there is a paedophile at the hostel, that's how I read it.
Posted by: tickety boo, york on 2:16pm Tue 6 May 08
while i have sympathy for the families of the girl spoken of above lets not forget that this isnt a secondary school thats in the middle of this its a primary school which has vulnerable children as young as 4 in it and who says the school isnt aware of the situation do you honestly think they would advertise the fact that just a short distance from where you entrust youre children everyday is a hostel full of god knows what i wouldnt think so or it would be a very empty school
Posted by: franky, york on 4:55pm Tue 6 May 08
Who says the school isn't aware of the situation raised by the unfounded leaflets, tickety boo?

The article says...
She said the claim may or may not be true, and the school had no information on the matter
Posted by: comment, Leeds on 4:58pm Tue 6 May 08
Please could we all remeber that there is no evidence in this article that the person responsible for this crime is actually a sex offender or has anything to do with the hostel. He/she could just be a scaremonger who thinks this will be a good way of stiring people against the hostel, perhaps because he or she doesn't like it being in the area.
Posted by: GeorgeAppleby, Clifton, York. on 5:37pm Tue 6 May 08
There does not appear to have been any definite statement by anybody that there is not a convicted pedophile in the hostel and I think, if there is one, people should know. These people should not be put so close to a school.

Life has always had dangers, and always will. In the past people knew who was among them; now they don't and have to do their best to protect their young against unseen threats.

They should be helped by the authorities in this, not hindered. Even if the freedom of a convicted person suffers.

The young are far more valuable to society and we are too lax with dangerous people.

Only yesterday we learned that dangerous criminals had been sent to open prisons where they could walk out if they wanted.

IT"S ALRIGHT SAYING "DON"T SCARE MONGER"

Better safe than sorry is a much better approach.

Posted by: Bemused, York on 8:35pm Tue 6 May 08
Posted by: comment, Leeds on 4:58pm today
Please could we all remember that there is no evidence in this article that the person responsible for this crime is actually a sex offender or has anything to do with the hostel. He/she could just be a scaremonger who thinks this will be a good way of stirring people against the hostel, perhaps because he or she doesn't like it being in the area.
Please could we all remember that there is no evidence in this article that the person responsible for this crime is actually a sex offender or has anything to do with the hostel. He/she could just be a scaremonger who thinks this will be a good way of stirring people against the hostel, perhaps because he or she doesn't like it being in the area.

And I believe in fairies at the bottom of my garden.

Better safe than sorry because if people don't protect themselves and their children, no one else will. The probation service has an appalling track record and only looks after the interests of criminals.

Probation hostels should be situated out of town, well away from residential areas and schools.

Posted by: petethefeet, York on 9:32pm Tue 6 May 08
When I had my dealings with the PS (not from a criminal side I should add), I kept coming up against the "Christian" lobby. They seem to be dominated by ex-monks and the like. They are also wedded to the "care in the community" theme with no regard to the effect that their operations have on Society.
The thing that really irks me is when the lefty-lovies of the BBC have a discussion program concerning the criminal-justice system. THEY ALWAYS GET SOME GEYSER ON FROM THE PS. Think about this - these peoples whole career structure is bound up with this rehab-in-the-communi
ty cr@p. So they have a vested interest in this approach. Are they gonna argue against it?
Posted by: bobby, york on 9:41pm Tue 6 May 08
i am the father of the now 18 year old but then 16 year old who got mixed up with the convicted rapist mentioned in the above story.the sex offenders in the bail hostel are not under supervision outside only once they are phsically in the building.i can prove that the rapist mydaughter got mixed up with- bought alcahol from the local shops for a drinking session down the side of poppy road school for gigls of my daughters age then 16 and also he and his fellow convicted sex offender mates were taking drugs openley-supervision is a joke at the hostel- i found out from a member of staff who was in there and for what-thats how i found out what he was convicted for.the only thing to come out of this is that nothings changed and its only a matter of time that one of these monsters strikes and then perhaps some of the dogooders of this world will sit up and say you were right- DO SOMETHING NOW-IT COULD BE YOURE CHILD GRANDCHILD- WHO KNOWS.
Posted by: Gardener, NZ on 10:13pm Tue 6 May 08
... typical of the head at that school who's so far up her own **** she can't see the real world. Not the first time they've housed kiddy fiddlers in Southview either nor the last. Put them on ships in the middle of the sea somewhere cold that'll cool their urges!
Posted by: bobby, york on 10:51pm Tue 6 May 08
I have first hand experince of these "men" who live in this bail hostel as am the girl 'only human' and 'bobby' are talking about.
I also know for a fact although the only people who can prove it is the authorities that there are convited sex offenders living in that hostel..i have seen with my very own eyes a "man" appear at the main bedroom window of the bail hostel over looking the main street as the school children are walking home from school and staying there till the majority of the children and may i add most with their parents have walked past then he would leave the window on a number of times!
The hostel needs to be away from residential area let alone schools!
once these "men" have you "hooked" they can twist everything and the only way they know how to keep hold of some 1 is to make them feel like YOU need THEM..which is what happend to me,he made me feel like if i wasnt with him i was nothing..he nearly destoryed my relationship with my parents and manged it with many of my friends till the point i'd class my "friends" to be some of these so called men from the bail hostel (may i add each and every1 was a sex offender and had carried out attacks on children as young as 9) If i ever tried to see my parents which was onli twice a month he would put the guilt trip on me making me feel like i had betrayed him by seeing my own parents.
If you go agasint them they get physical..i had 6 months of hitting punching pinning up agasint walls because if i didnt argee to do things.it was only when i was 6 months preg i got out after he punched me in the face i was flung over a high backed chair and got "offerd" another to match the back eye that had come out in a matter of seconds.
He got put on remand for it then they decieded to put the date back..and so on...till he was on remand for 3 months then decieded he had done enough time for it and was let out and i had 2 go through a solictors to keep him away from me and my then unborn child.
These "men" which i find it hard to call them men as no one who does that is a man let alone human should be locked away for good never to see the outside world again.
I know aleast 1 child will be safe from a sex offender because the "man" i was with will never see MY son by my choice and by social servies choice far as i care my son does not have a father..not 1 biologicaly anyway!
Posted by: only human, huntington on 11:24pm Tue 6 May 08
Well said girl,,very brave of you to give out such intimitate details.
Posted by: petethefeet, York on 11:27pm Tue 6 May 08
Quite a few years ago, I got drunk at the lawyers hotel in Perthshire with some mates and an extraordinary couple. We learned that the guy's job, who was a martial arts expert, was to train soldiers to stay alive in Northern Ireland. He wouldn't admit it but we suspected he was SAS. By contrast, his wife ran a unit to integrate sex-offenders back into society. Late in the evening, as she stared melancholy into her drink she confessed that "they were not fixed"! And that's the issue. There is only one way to fix a poedophile and that is castration. I'm not following others in being dramatic, it's just the way it is. So, true poedophiles have to be locked up for life unless they submit to this treatment.
Posted by: Fly-On-The-Wall, Here'n'There on 11:50pm Tue 6 May 08
bobby wrote:
I have first hand experince of these "men" who live in this bail hostel as am the girl 'only human' and 'bobby' are talking about.
I also know for a fact although the only people who can prove it is the authorities that there are convited sex offenders living in that hostel..i have seen with my very own eyes a "man" appear at the main bedroom window of the bail hostel over looking the main street as the school children are walking home from school and staying there till the majority of the children and may i add most with their parents have walked past then he would leave the window on a number of times!
The hostel needs to be away from residential area let alone schools!
once these "men" have you "hooked" they can twist everything and the only way they know how to keep hold of some 1 is to make them feel like YOU need THEM..which is what happend to me,he made me feel like if i wasnt with him i was nothing..he nearly destoryed my relationship with my parents and manged it with many of my friends till the point i'd class my "friends" to be some of these so called men from the bail hostel (may i add each and every1 was a sex offender and had carried out attacks on children as young as 9) If i ever tried to see my parents which was onli twice a month he would put the guilt trip on me making me feel like i had betrayed him by seeing my own parents.
If you go agasint them they get physical..i had 6 months of hitting punching pinning up agasint walls because if i didnt argee to do things.it was only when i was 6 months preg i got out after he punched me in the face i was flung over a high backed chair and got "offerd" another to match the back eye that had come out in a matter of seconds.
He got put on remand for it then they decieded to put the date back..and so on...till he was on remand for 3 months then decieded he had done enough time for it and was let out and i had 2 go through a solictors to keep him away from me and my then unborn child.
These "men" which i find it hard to call them men as no one who does that is a man let alone human should be locked away for good never to see the outside world again.
I know aleast 1 child will be safe from a sex offender because the "man" i was with will never see MY son by my choice and by social servies choice far as i care my son does not have a father..not 1 biologicaly anyway!
NAME HIM THEN and let people know exactly who and where he is now!
I for one will be the first in line to give him the worst time of his life and this site is browsed by thousands of decent people who will i'm sure make certain that he wont stay in York for long.
Posted by: bobby, york on 9:29am Wed 7 May 08
Id be more than happy to name every single 1 of them (i could name at least 6 of the top of my head) but the laws that much of a sham id get in more touble than the sex offenders would the law procects and look after their safety like their lives worth every min..and it isnt these men have all taken there victims dignaity and they will never be able to get over what these men have done to them-while these men are free to wonder around the streets and wonder past a school when ever they like!
The man i was with told me the hostel is only for people who are out on licence after carrying out sex attacks there fore being on the sex offenders register and whos going to know it better than a sex offender him self.
the hostel is a sham aswell they give the scum 3 warnings and if they scum use them they get chucked out making them free to wonder the streets and leaving the public at danger!
I hope my experince which these men helps every one else and i hope it helps get the hostel moved as its one of the worst things to go and i would not wish it upon anyone..i lost 11 months of my life phyiscaly to this man but what he did will never leave me and i have to tell my son what type of man he is!
this hostel needs to be moved away asap its disgusting what these men are allowed to do when there registerd sex offenders....EVERY SINGLE 1 IN THE BAIL HOSTEL
Posted by: bobby, york on 9:34am Wed 7 May 08
I have also seen 1 of the sex offenders walking through the market in the centre of town and that was only last friday.another works for the CYC of all poeple.just goes to show at some point you WILL be near a sex offender!
Posted by: Fly-On-The-Wall, Here'n'There on 8:48pm Fri 9 May 08
bobby wrote:
I have also seen 1 of the sex offenders walking through the market in the centre of town and that was only last friday.another works for the CYC of all poeple.just goes to show at some point you WILL be near a sex offender!
Hey Bobby.

My email is :-
flyonthewall@fsmail.
net

Drop me a line or two?
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