Robert John Fardon to face one final hearing

QUEENSLAND’S most notorious sex-offender Robert John Fardon will face a final hearing over his supervision order next month.

QUEENSLAND’S most notorious sex-offender Robert John Fardon will face a final hearing over his supervision order next month.

The hearing comes after the State Government last week won a last-ditch appeal to stop him being released into the community without restrictions.

The Queensland Court of Appeal last Wednesday overturned the original decision by Justice David Jackson to release the serial-rapist without supervision, finding Fardon would be a “serious danger to the community” if freed from the order.

The 69-year-old’s supervision order was due to expire last Wednesday, having been in place since 2013.

It was extended until the new hearing.

The Brisbane Supreme Court today set down the final hearing for the Queensland Attorney-General’s application to have the supervision order extended further for November 30.

Last week, the Court of Appeal considered the view of several medical professionals, who over the past 15 years deemed Fardon’s risk of violent sexual reoffending as substantial, moderate or high, in coming to their decision.

Rapist Robert John Fardon

The court found even though other psychiatrists and psychologists had in recent years found the notorious sex offender’s risk of reoffending had lowered, the “prolonged period of past dangerousness” was a “powerful consideration” to extend the supervision order.

“The fact of the Court’s findings of dangerousness and the number of expert conclusions that the respondent posed a moderate to high level of risk over such a prolonged period, combined with the respondent’s past offending, provide reasonable grounds for believing the respondent is still a serious danger to the community in the absence of a further supervision order,” the judgement said.

A supervision order requires serious sexual offenders to report to and receive visits from police, abide by curfews or monitoring and not live within certain distances of schools or children’s playgrounds.

The sex-offender under the order cannot leave Queensland without permission and can be drug or alcohol tested.

Fardon is considered one of Queensland’s worst sex offenders, was jailed for 13 years in 1988 for the violent rape of a woman shockingly committed a further rape just four months after being released from jail.

He is also responsible for the rape of a 12-year-old girl at gunpoint.