Please attribute to New Zealand Parole Board chairperson, Sir Ron Young:

Today’s events at the High Court in Christchurch provide the first opportunity for me to publicly express my profound sympathy to the family and friends of Nicole Tuxford.

Her sexual violation and murder was tragic, dreadful, and appalling. I am acutely aware of the tremendous hurt that Nicole’s loved ones must feel. Today I am also thinking of the family of Mr Tainui’s first victim, Kim Schroder.

Paul Tainui was released on parole in January 2011. At that time, the Board had decided he could be managed on conditions in the community. The decision was made by a panel of five experienced Board members and based on extensive information, including psychological opinion.

Parole was subject to a range of standard and special conditions, detailed in the Board decisions which I am releasing online today.

One of those decisions is from August 2011, when Mr Tainui’s progress was assessed. It found he “had a very good start and has done very well indeed”. The Board can only legally hold monitoring hearings for up to a year after release.

Thereafter, the Board could only have had further involvement with Mr Tainui if a recall application was made by Police or Community Corrections, on the basis that his behaviour deteriorated, posing an undue risk.

The Board cannot initiate a recall itself, but acts quickly when it receives a recall application. An interim recall application was received and granted by the Board on 9 April 2018. Prior to that, no recall applications were made to the Board regarding Paul Tainui in the seven years he spent on parole.

Reoffending like this is both extremely rare and deeply concerning to me as the Board’s chairperson. For this reason, Professor Devon Polaschek was commissioned to conduct an independent review of the Board’s involvement with Mr Tainui in the lead-up to his release.

The full findings will be released publicly, once Nicole’s family has had an opportunity to receive them and ask any questions, if that is their wish.

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