IT BEGGARS belief that dangerous child sex offender Michael Wilson is at large in the community when, as police warn, there is "every likelihood" he will re-offend.

But as much anger as incredulity is aroused by the buck-passing and blundering that has let this top-risk pervert loose.

It is unbelievable that a person classed as a Schedule One sex offender with a string of vile crimes against boys could, while on bail and under the supervision of the probation service, have been put on a train in Accrington.

He was told to make his own way to Liverpool where he faces a burglary charge - and so was allowed to disappear.

This act of insanity is compounded by the fact that probation officials took this step after carrying out a risk assessment on him and concluding he was too dangerous to be kept at the Accrington bail hostel to which he had been sent. This folly, with all its potential for terrifying consequences, must be investigated and corrected with the severest discipline. So, too, must so much of the other manifest slackness and irresponsibility in the system.

Why, when he appeared at Liverpool, did the court decide not to remand him in custody - when his record and certified menace demanded exactly that?

Why was he sent to Accrington by Merseyside's probation service - to live in a hostel in a residential area where householders, quite rightly it turns out, were already expressing concern that the offenders there posed a risk to them?

Why did he come to Accrington without a risk assessment?

We are sure that the hard-pressed police lumbered with the task of finding this monster would like answers to these questions. And we are absolutely certain that worried parents would, too.

Home Secretary Jack Straw should unleash an urgent and open investigation.

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