<div id="subtitle">California inspector general faults supervision of DugardÕs alleged kidnapper</div><div><p> The man accused of kidnapping Jaycee Dugard and holding her captive for 18 years was improperly supervised during the 10 years he was under the jurisdiction of California parole authorities.</p><p> So says the California inspector general, who documented his findings in a report released last week.</p><p>Dugard was 11 and living in South Lake Tahoe when, police say, she was kidnapped by Phillip Garrido in 1991. At the time, he was on federal parole after having been convicted of kidnapping and rape in 1977.</p><p>CaliforniaÕs corrections department assumed parole responsibility for Garrido in 1999 because he was living in the state. After Dugard was rescued and Garrido arrested in August, the inspector general began investigating how a sex-crime parolee, supposedly under tight supervision, could now stand accused of kidnapping and sexual assault.</p><p>The inspector general reviewed an assessment of the case by the corrections department. Astonishingly, the departmentÕs own review had found that GarridoÕs supervision was inadequate for 111 of the 123 months he was under its jurisdiction.</p><p>A failure by parole officers to regularly visit Garrido at his home in Antioch was cited in the report. That failure was likely the fault of department supervisors, who reportedly erred in interpreting rules governing supervision of high-level sex offenders.</p><p>Another documented failure was that of not paying attention to signals from a monitoring device placed on GarridoÕs ankle in 2008. This allowed him to travel freely — and to go unchallenged on the inordinate amount of time he was spending in the back yard of his sizable property, where police say Dugard was being held.</p><p>Also, when parole officers did visit Garrido, they missed obvious clues, including power lines extending to buildings in his back yard that police say housed Dugard and eventually her two children. Parole officers also neglected to talk with GarridoÕs neighbors to learn what they knew about his activities.</p><p>The report should be required reading for all parole officers in the country. An earlier rescue of Dugard could have occurred were it not for so many mistakes.</p><img src="http://admatch-syndication.mochila.com/images/ad.gif?aid=63044310&bid=informcom" /></div><div id="copyright"><div>

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