Serial rapist to be released despite 'high risk' to WA community

A high-risk sexual offender who has spent most of his life behind bars for raping multiple women and a five-year-old girl in Western Australia's far north is set to be released from prison.

Warning: This story contains details of sexual assault.

Adrian Pindan was convicted of five sexual offences from 1989 to 2007 and received a 10-year prison sentence in 1997 for the rape of a five-year-old girl.

In 2012, a WA Justice imposed an indefinite detention order on Pindan, who is now aged 59 and has been in custody since 2007.

However, last week a Supreme Court Justice agreed to Pindan's release, despite accepting he remains a high-risk serious offender.

Justice Bruno Fiannaca said the risk to the community could be mitigated by suitable accommodation, "significant" NDIS funding and 24-hour supervision, in his judgment handed down on October 23.

The 52 conditions of his release include electronic monitoring, a curfew, avoiding contact with female community members, and not consuming alcohol.

Justice Fiannaca granted a suppression order to prevent the publication of the suburb of Pindan's future accommodation to avoid community members targeting him.

'Indiscriminate' offending

Pindan's ongoing detention order has been reviewed and subsequently extended six previous times between 2014 and 2021.

The court heard his offending occurred in the Kimberley towns of Fitzroy Crossing, Derby and Broome over an 18-year period.

Pindan raped three women and the five-year-old child, with the offences being labelled as "indiscriminate".

He also broke into an elderly woman's home in Broome in 1988 and tried to assault her while she was in bed with her husband.

The court heard that while in prison, Pindan displayed "predatory" behaviour towards female staff, but Justice Fiannaca accepted this behaviour had reduced in recent years.

Pindan was transferred from the West Kimberley Regional Prison to Perth's Acacia Prison in August 2023 after being assaulted by a fellow inmate, after allegedly saying "he was going to rape someone".

Cognitive impairment and lack of services

Pindan has a cognitive impairment, preventing his participation in any rehabilitation program or taking any step to address the causes of his offending.

When issuing the ongoing detention order in 2012, Justice Lindy Jenkins said "determined efforts" needed to be made to avoid him spending the rest of his life in prison.

However, when granting Pindan's release, Justice Fiannaca said these conditions were now in place.

"I am satisfied the respondent's circumstances have changed, both in terms of some changes in his behaviour and in the measures now available to manage his risk in the community,"

he said.

Pindan is set to be released into the community on December 2, with a supervision order put in place for seven years.