Milton Orkopoulos: Child sex offender and former NSW minister bashed in prison

CONVICTED child sex offender and former NSW minister Milton Orkopoulos has been bashed in prison and taken to hospital with head injuries.

CONVICTED child sex offender and former NSW minister Milton Orkopoulos has been bashed in prison and taken to hospital with head injuries.

An inmate alerted a guard and said the former Labor minister for Aboriginal affairs had “fallen down the stairs” at Cooma Correctional Centre.

Orkopoulos was found dazed in his cell with head wounds on Tuesday and asked the warden what had happened.

He was treated by doctors at the prison before being transferred to Cooma Base Hospital for further care before being returned to the prison.

Orkopoulos, 58, was jailed in 2008 for almost 14 years for ­offences including homosexual assaults on a minor, possessing child pornography, having sex without consent and supplying prohibited drugs.

During his sentencing Judge Ralph Coolahan said Orkopoulos had been “premeditated, predatory and manipulative” in his assaults on two underage boys while his ­assaults on a third young male victim were a “gross breach of trust”. The 30 drug and child sex charges levelled against him included using taxpayers’ money to pay a teenage boy to have sex with him. His earliest chance at parole is in 2017.

It was a huge fall from grace for the ALP MP, who had taken the boys to Parliament House and smoked cannabis with them in his office.

A Corrective Services spokesman said: “A 58-year-old inmate at Cooma Correctional Centre suffered head injuries ... An initial report suggested the inmate had fallen down stairs but his injuries suggest the possibility of an ­assault.”

Orkopoulos, 58, was imprisoned in 2008 for almost 14 years for ­offences including homosexual assaults on a minor, possessing child pornography, having sex without consent and supplying prohibited drugs.