Serial lingerer jailed again
Serial offender Margaret Mabel Dodds has been jailed again for lingering near a boy at a bus stop.
The 60-year-old resident of Seager Clinic at Princess Margaret Hospital is serving a two-year term of intensive supervision with a condition that she not have any contact with children under 16.
The supervision terms state she is not to “approach, linger around, follow, associate, nor otherwise have any contact with any person 16 years of age or under” unless there is an approved adult present.
The supervision sentence was interrupted by a four month prison term being imposed by Christchurch District Court Judge Brian Callaghan this year when she was convicted of lingering around a boy playing with a ball at a playground.
The judge said at her sentencing that it had been chilling to hear that Dodds had been thinking about what she could do to the boy.
She was released from that prison term on May 18 and returned to Seager Clinic where the release terms were explained to her.
She was in trouble again within hours, after leaving the clinic the same day. Hospital staff told probation who sent two officers down.
They found her sitting at a bus stop and talked to her about her sentence requirements, but Dodds said she “couldn’t care less”.
The officers went to check with hospital staff and when they came back 15min later, Dodds was still at the bus shelter, but she was “staring intently” at a young family which was approaching the shelter.
The family included a boy aged under five. Dodds made no effort to move even when she was told to do so by staff, saying: “It’s not my fault he’s in my space. I was here first.”
Probation officers told her three times to move, and reminded her of the special conditions, but Dodds simply abused them. The police were called and she was arrested.
She came before Judge Callaghan again today when she made an appearance in court by video-link from Christchurch Women’s Prison and pleaded guilty to the charge of breaching her supervision. She waived her right to a pre-sentence report and the judge immediately jailed her for four-and-a-half months.
She has already been held in custody since her arrest on May 18.
Dodds has convictions for assault and trespass. Dodds is trespassed from buses and many malls and public facilities around Christchurch. Warning messages have been posted around school staffroom noticeboards and her outings around the city often lead to messages and photographs being posted on social media.
Category: News
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