Inquiry into why serial sex offender was free to rape

AN investigation is to be launched to determine why a serial sex offender was left free to rape and murder an elderly grandmother when he was meant to be under strict supervision.

Kevin Rooney was jailed in June for a minimum of 21 years for pleading guilty to the killing of Rosina Sutherland.

The 26-year-old was meant to be monitored under the rules of a prevention order for previous offences but was instead placed in an unsupervised bed and breakfast in south-west Edinburgh.

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As the Evening News revealed in June, Rooney had 36 previous convictions and had been jailed on 22 occasions.

Had the order been enforced it could have stopped him from going anywhere near his 74-year-old victim, who was murdered in a sheltered housing complex in Longstone.

Now Edinburgh City Council – whose social workers were responsible for placing Rooney at the Longstone Guest House – has agreed to an external review into the “management” of their subject.

Mrs Sutherland’s family today welcomed the announcement that the local authority will probe why Rooney was not under supervision.

Her daughter Teresa, 44, said: “I’m pleased that they are now taking our questions seriously. This is what we’ve been aiming for since our mum was murdered. We believe many mistakes were made in the run-up to our mum’s death.

“The inquiry will hopefully get to the bottom of whether she died as a result of somebody’s negligence or if it was the result of an ineffective system for monitoring sex offenders.”

Last month Wendy Halstead, owner of the Longstone Guest House, told how she was not informed about Rooney’s past when he came to stay with her. She assumed he was a homeless man who the local authority had housed.

Sex offenders in Scotland are monitored under the Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements, which is comprised of police and councils, among other organisations. Rooney had been placed at the guest house under the MAPPA scheme just two days before murdering Mrs Sutherland last October. He had been freed just seven weeks earlier on bail.

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On the night of October 29 Rooney had been wandering the streets in a daze of drugs and alcohol before trying Mrs Sutherland’s door and finding it unlocked.

He pushed the pensioner to the floor before raping her.

Stealing hundreds of pounds along with her walking stick, he went to the nearby 
Longstone Inn and bought drinks for strangers.

Rooney was picked up drunk in the street by police hours after the killing and confessed to the murder.

His footprint was later found on the broken glass of a framed photograph of the deceased’s grandchildren.

Gordon MacDonald MSP, who represents Edinburgh Pentlands, said of the council investigation: “The remit of the review must be so wide-ranging that no question about this awful case remains unanswered.”

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