Skip to content

'Paper bag rapist' Oughton agrees he is a risk

John Horace Oughton agrees with a recent prison psychiatric assessment that found the man known as the “paper bag rapist” was a high risk to re-offend if he was granted parole. The surprise admission was contained in the 62-year-old Oughton’s letter to the National Parole Board the day before he was scheduled to appear for a Sept. 20 parole review.

John Horace Oughton agrees with a recent prison psychiatric assessment that found the man known as the “paper bag rapist” was a high risk to re-offend if he was granted parole.

The surprise admission was contained in the 62-year-old Oughton’s letter to the National Parole Board the day before he was scheduled to appear for a Sept. 20 parole review.

In the letter, Oughton announced he was withdrawing from the hearing, claiming it was on the advice of his lawyer.

He complained that the review panel had already made up its mind and said he “agreed with the psychological opinion dated July 15, 2011.”

The psychologist who did the assessment had rated Oughton’s risk to re-offend “generally, violently and sexually” as high.

It was only the latest in a long run of mental health assessments that all rated Oughton as a dangerously manipulative personality who cannot be trusted to control himself outside prison.

The Oughton letter was described in a just-released parole board decision denying him any form of supervised release from prison.

Oughton was declared a dangerous offender in 1986, after he admitted to sexually assaulting more than 140 women and children during a 10-year rampage that included Burnaby, Langley and other Lower Mainland communities.

Under Canadian law, a person declared a dangerous offender is jailed with no release date but is entitled to a review of parole eligibility every two years.

The 61-year-old former hot tub salesman was nicknamed the “paper bag rapist” for his habit of placing coverings over his face or the faces of his victims.

Two of them were 11-year-olds from Langley.

The new parole board report shows Oughton has become less and less co-operative over the years of his imprisonment.

He now refuses to attend sex offender counseling, claiming he should have a different type of therapy than that provided in prison.

The last time he showed up for group therapy in 2000, Oughton “showed little respect for the privacy of the other men in the group and tried to intimidate and dominate the facilitator,” the parole board noted.

He was kicked out of the program.

Oughton has racked up 39 “institutional charges” or violations of prison rules since he was jailed, most recently challenging another inmate to a fight and refusing to be locked up in his cell. These offences landed him in “involuntary segregation” or what used to be called solitary confinement.



Dan Ferguson

About the Author: Dan Ferguson

Best recognized for my resemblance to St. Nick, I’m the guy you’ll often see out at community events and happenings around town.
Read more