Paedophile keeps compo payout
- By Lisa Davies
- The Daily Telegraph
- March 13, 2007 12:00AM
A PAEDOPHILE will be allowed to keep his $175,000 compensation payout awarded after he was bashed in jail.
The Court of Appeal has just handed down a decision allowing Peter Andrew Bujdoso to keep the money despite a State Government appeal that he be refused access to the money.
Bujdoso last September won a Supreme Court battle to keep the money in damages after being assaulted in Sydney‘s Silverwater Jail.
He had been serving a two-and-a-half year term for child sex offences when he was bashed by fellow inmates.
Bujdoso had refused protective custody while he was in jail.
The former teacher suffered brain damage when a group of masked men broke into his cell and attacked him with metal bars.
After his release from jail in 1992 he sued the NSW government for negligence, claiming prison authorities knew he was likely to be targeted but failed to adequately protect him.
He was awarded the $175,000 payout by the district court in July, 2006, and was granted immediate access to the money by the Supreme Court on September 5.
Justice Minister Tony Kelly ordered the case be appealed, saying the court decision had overruled “important legislation” which meant the money should have been frozen for six months to enable Bujdoso’s victims to sue for a share of the money.
In a judgement handed down by Justices David Hodgson, David Ipp and John Basten today, the application was dismissed with the government ordered to pay costs.
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