New Bedford Police criticize low bail for sex offender
By Globe Staff
New Bedford Police are crying foul after a local judge set bail at $1,000 for a convicted sex offender who police believe should be kept off the streets.
 Allen Thurston |
The bail was set this week for Allen Thurston, a Level 3 sex offender, by New Bedford District Court Judge Bernadette Sabra, on a charge of failing to register with the state’s sex offender board.
Police believe the judge should have exercised her power to simply order him held without bail. She had that power because Thurston was already out on bail on a recent charge of domestic assault and battery, said Lieutenant Jeffrey P. Silva, the New Bedford Police spokesman. He said police were "aghast" at the judge's decision to set bail instead.
Thurston was convicted in 1998 in Brockton of rape of a child with force and has been convicted twice before for failing to register as a sex offender, Silva said.
Silva said Thurston has a record that is "10 feet long" with “a zillion charges” on it, including both property and violent crimes.
“He’s a career criminal,” Silva said. “He’s not too interested in society.”
Sabra defended her decision in a telephone interview this afternoon.
“It’s a decision that I’m standing by,” she said. “I listened to everything, evaluated what I could based on what they gave me in court, and I set bail at $1,000, which is holding him in jail.”
Noting that Thurston is homeless, she said she set a bail that she felt “would be sufficient to ensure his appearance in court, which is what bail is meant to do.”
Thurston's attorney, Erin Steadman, was not in her office this afternoon.
If convicted of failing to register as a sex offender for a third time, Thurston faces a minimum mandatory sentence of five years in state prison.
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