Dangerous escaped prisoner Mark Anthony Taylor was back behind bars last night after he was found hiding in a Christchurch house.
Taylor, serving preventive detention for violent sex crimes, gave himself up quietly after police knocked on the door of a house in the suburb of Philipstown about 8.30pm.
His arrest came
after an extensive search using dogs and a helicopter, and visits to many homes in the area since his escape from Christchurch's Paparua Prison on Tuesday.
Taylor will appear in the Christchurch District Court today.
The Corrections Department said Taylor was classed as a high to medium-security prisoner and the escape was the first in three years from Paparua.
Last year, 26 people escaped from the department's care. Nine of those were termed "break-outs".
Taylor was given preventive detention - the toughest sentence available in New Zealand - last June after he admitted charges of rape, two of unlawful sexual connection, seven of burglary, two of theft, attempted unlawful sexual connection, unlawfully taking a vehicle and assaulting a female.
Most of the offences related to an incident when Taylor forced his way into the home of a 56-year-old Otago woman and sexually attacked her.
During sentencing, Justice Graham Panckhurst said Taylor posed an "unacceptably high risk to the community", and particularly to women.
- NZPA
