Daughter runs into mum's killer

MOVING ON: Douglas Thompson outside his Panama villa yesterday.PHOTO/GERALD FORD

A young woman's chance encounter with the man who shot and killed her mother has led to a convicted double murderer being evicted from Panama Village in Masterton.

Douglas Arthur Thompson, 70, is being moved on by the Department of Corrections after a short tenancy at the village and at the request of village owners, the Masterton District Council.

Only a few days ago the daughter of murder victim Helen Johns, who along with her partner Paul Allen was gunned down in her home by Thompson at Rongotea in 2001, visited a Panama Village tenant she is close to and calls Nana, only to come face-to-face with Thompson.

She was with a close friend and the daughter of the woman tenant being visited and, according to those present, was so upset at "running head-first into him" she had "freaked out" and scrambled back into her car, driving straight back to Hunterville where she now lives.

Thompson served 13 years in prison for the double murder, which involved him following them home from a Christmas party, killing them then turning himself in to police.

He was released after a parole hearing on July 6 with several conditions imposed on him.

Those included GPS monitoring for a year, a ban from entering Manawatu and Rangitikei, and orders forbidding him from drinking alcohol and using guns.

Council finance manager David Paris, whose job includes having responsibility for council housing, confirmed Corrections had been asked to move Thompson on.

He said this was despite assurances given when Thompson was allocated a flat at Panama after his release that he was "very low risk", was being monitored and that the council had beenmade fully aware of his background.

The decision was inevitable once it was discovered a woman with close connections to the victims was already a tenant at Panama, he said.

Mr Paris said the circumstances of the murdered woman's daughter coming across Thompson were "bizarre" and "a one in a million chance" but left the council with no choice.

"We have put it to Corrections they will have to find him somewhere else to live," Mr Paris said.

Those already living at Panama had not been told of Thompson's criminal background before his arrival at the village.

Mr Paris said it had to be recognised that he had "done his time" and the council had no obligation to disclose his business to other tenants or to ratepayers in general.

"We don't want to see him driven out by a Nimby response but we hadn't known a woman with a close relationship to a victim was living there too," he said.

Mr Paris said the chance encounter with Thompson must have been "horrendous" for the young woman visiting Panama.

The Times-Age was first alerted to Thompson's presence at the village not long after his release date from prison.

At that time residents living at Panama did not know who he was but they said they felt uncomfortable because Thompson was wearing an electronic bracelet on his ankle, alerting them to the fact he was being monitored.