A convicted sex offender who once escaped from a West Australian prison has told a Brisbane court he wants to remain in jail because he would "find it very difficult to comply with any supervision order".
Paul Thompson appeared in the dock of the Supreme Court in Brisbane on Monday for the first review of a detention order, which has kept him behind bars indefinitely since May 2017.
Despite last year launching an unsuccessful appeal against the continuing detention order, Thompson yesterday told the court he wanted to "extend [the order] at this stage".
"I just find it very difficult to comply with any supervision order at this stage … because I need to consolidate my treatment with a psychologist … in custody," Thompson said from the prisoner's dock.
Thompson's criminal history includes convictions for touching and fondling adolescent boys.
He escaped from the former Pardelup Prison Farm, near Mount Barker in southern WA in the 1990s, before he was arrested by Indonesian authorities in 2004.
Yesterday, the court heard evidence from one psychiatrist that Thompson's risk of future sexual offending — if released from prison without a supervision order — fell in the "high range".
The court was told psychiatric reports indicated Thompson would comply with a supervision order, but now he'd instructed his lawyers that he wanted to consent to a continuing detention order instead.
Psychiatrist Jane Phillips said she'd be "loathed" to suggest putting Thompson on a supervision order if he wouldn't comply.
Justice Martin Burns said he was concerned the submissions were a "significant departure" from what Thompson had told others previously and said there was a need to explore how a supervision order would operate in a practical sense.
The case has been adjourned to a hearing in May.
