No prison until 8th offence?

NZPA report:

For probably his eighth sexual offence against child victims, Christopher John Ball has gone to prison indefinitely with a preventive detention term imposed in the High Court at Christchurch today.

His victims range from a girl aged two or three to a boy aged 14, and the offending was spread over about 11 years.

The 27-year-old invalid beneficiary had admitted two charges of having sexual connection with the 14-year-old boy who was confused about his own sexual orientation at the time.

Justice Christine French noted that Ball had four previous convictions for sexual offending and had made voluntary disclosures of three more offences to the health assessors who prepared reports for his sentencing.

Preventive detention is the right call here. When I first read this article, I wondered how many offences would have been prevented if three strikes had been operating, as this was his fifth conviction.

But what staggered me as I read more closely was this:

He had never before been to prison nor undertaken the Kia Marama programme.

Never been before to prison? And he had four previous convictions? Maybe there were at the “light” end of sexual offending.

Ball has convictions for rape of a small girl, two for sexual connection with a six-year-old boy, and a conviction for anal intercourse with a boy aged under 16.

And none of those got him prison time? You want to know why laws such as three strikes reduce judicial discretion – that is why.

Actually I can’t quite believe that he has never been to prison for such offending. Maybe the lawyer is misquoted? Is there any way to find out?