Change in attitude helped Stewart Murray Wilson get parole

Stewart Murray Wilson Photo/File

Serial sex offender Stewart Murray Wilson's change in attitude about pushing boundaries helped him get parole in March, the Parole Board says.

Wilson pleaded guilty on November 12 to breaching his parole conditions last year. He had been previously released on September 1, 2012, to live in the house on Wanganui Prison grounds but was recalled on April 10, 2013.

He was sentenced to six months in prison.

Wilson appeared before the Parole Board earlier this month and was granted parole from a date in late March.

The board's reasons for granting parole were released today.

They said they detected from the hearing and earlier hearings, an attitude by Wilson where he intended to comply with his release conditions. They also detected he would not push the boundaries in the way the Corrections Department considered he had been prone to do.

"We go back to the view that he has not been the subject of proved misconducts within the institution as opposed to simply being a difficult and resistant inmate who Corrections have seen difficulties trying to contain on release conditions."

Wilson had spoken positively to the board about continuing to work with a psychologist by way of writing down matters that related to some of his childhood and of his intention to continue to work on an intensified base with the psychologist in the near future, the board said.

"The board very firmly recommends that he continues to work with the psychologist to try and unravel some of the difficulties that Mr Wilson has had in the past and in particular in relation to his resistance towards behavioural change."

The board said he would be subject to a number of conditions, including GPS monitoring and he would stay in the same accommodation on the prison grounds where he was before he breached conditions.

"It appears that while he was in that accommodation he was engaged in useful and meaningful activities ranging from maintaining a vegetable garden through to outings, which was a useful form of reintegration for a man who has spent such a substantial period of time incarcerated."

His release date would give time for the proposed reintegration plan to be put into place and with the necessary monitoring to also be arranged.

"We are conscious that victims need to be advised and need time to adjust to the fact that Mr Wilson is coming back into the community at some point in 2015."

Wilson is serving 21 years after being sentenced in 1996 for sex and violence offences against women and girls, as well as charges of stupefying and bestiality.

He was paroled to a two-bedroom house, which had been moved onto the Wanganui Prison grounds for the purpose in 2012, after serving 18 years.

His 21-year sentence was scheduled to end on December 1 next year.

Release conditions include:

• to reside at the accommodation on prison grounds;

• to complete a reintegration programme;

• to be electronically tracked;

• no female is to be present at his accommodation;

• no contact with youths under 16 unless an adult is present;

• no access to the internet; and

• not to consume or possess illicit drugs or alcohol.