A HAMPSHIRE hostel that housed a violent rapist who went on to murder thought he posed a low risk of re-offending.

Julian Perkins, a former manager of Elderfield House, made the admission at the inquest of Naomi Bryant, who was murdered by Anthony Rice in 2005.

After assessing Rice at Leyhill Prison he recorded the rapist "presented a low risk of offending in the same manner as before". The 48-year-old was given a life sentence in 1989 for attempted rape, which he committed shortly after release from prison for another offence.

Mr Perkins, who had been in charge of the hostel for a year before Rice first visited, said: "For the previous 18 months he'd been in an open prison and leaving every day (to work in a laundry) at 6.30am and not returning until 6pm.

"He was visiting a local café and mixing and mingling with females," he added. "There was a report that at previous times he posed a high risk, but they were completed before he'd gone out into the community and proved himself, albeit on day release."

Rice had been at Elderfield House in Otterbourne for just 10 months before he met Ms Bryant in a Winchester pub, before murdering her at her home in Rowlings Road, Weeke.

Mr Perkins, who had no previous work experience with ex-offenders before he joined the hostel, revealed he was unaware of Rice's full conviction record.

Alison Hewitt, quizzing Mr Perkins at Winchester Crown Court yesterday (Thursday), asked if he knew Rice had once indecently assaulted a five-year-old.

"It would have made an interesting decision had we known," he said. "The chief executive of Langley House Trust (the charity that runs the hostel) had given an undertaking eight or nine years before that Elderfield House would not take ex-offenders with convictions against children, because of the proximity of the local school.

"It would have been a definite case for turning the application down."

Mr Perkins, now retired, said Elderfield House was about 120 yards from Otterbourne Primary School.

Asked if it was usual to take offenders who had just completed life sentences, he added: "I know of no instructions I was ever given not to take lifers."