Michael Fraser will undertake an assessment for sex offender treatment while on home detention. Photo / Otago Daily Times
Michael Fraser will undertake an assessment for sex offender treatment while on home detention. Photo / Otago Daily Times
WARNING: This story discusses sexual harm and may be distressing.
A Dunedin sex offender, who tried to rape a woman he had just met, will be allowed to use dating apps while on home detention.
The news has left the victim’s family despairing, but the man’s lawyer says his client,who spent six months behind bars, has been let down by the system and justice has now prevailed.
Michael John Danyon Fraser, 26, was originally jailed for two years and three months when he was sentenced in March, but that was reduced to six months’ home detention two weeks ago following an appeal to the High Court.
Corrections staff immediately met Fraser, who confirmed he had deleted his online accounts.
An urgent application was made to the court proposing greater restrictions, including a ban from dating websites and a condition he inform a Probation officer if he entered an intimate relationship.
Fraser's Tinder profile, supplied to the Herald, when it emerged that he had activated a profile on a popular dating app. Photo / Tinder
However, in the Dunedin District Court this week Corrections formally withdrew the application.
Crown prosecutor Pip Norman, representing the department, said after review and advice it had abandoned the review on “jurisdictional grounds”.
No further details were provided.
The parents of the victim were devastated to hear of the result.
“We are pretty disgusted by that outcome. Who’s going to be held accountable once he entices his next victim to his house,” the father said.
“I sincerely hope we aren’t saying ‘I told them so’ in a few months.”
Dunedin sex offender Michael John Danyon Fraser (26) tried to rape a woman he had just met. Photo / Otago Daily Times
Fraser’s counsel, John Munro, said his client was now keen to get on with the sentence and get the treatment he needed for his autism spectrum disorder, which the High Court accepted was a pivotal factor in the crimes.
Munro acknowledged the victim had “suffered immensely” and said he hoped she would now have some closure.
“Some would say Fraser has been let down. Until recently there was not sensible consideration of what justice really requires in a case like this,” he said.
“The final result for Fraser demonstrated that we have a good system of justice and that justice does prevail.”
At sentencing, the court heard Fraser met his victim at a bar in the Octagon on April 23 last year.
