Teenage victim of migrant sex attacker slams 'disgusting' treatment after predator's accidental release
Hadush Kebatu was mistakenly freed from HMP Chelmsford last month
The teenage girl who was sexually assaulted by asylum seeker Hadush Kebatu says she has received "disgusting" treatment following her attacker's mistaken release from prison.
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In a statement released over a week on from Kebatu's escape, the girl said it felt like she was put in danger "all over again" while he was on the run.
She added that the £500 payment he had received after threatening to mount a legal challenge against his removal was "like he got paid for what he had done to me."
In the statement to ITV News, which was read by Epping Forest district councillor Shane Yerrell, the girl said: "I think it’s disgusting how me and my family have been treated in all of this and it’s not fair that he was released by accident.
Read more: Former prison officers 'baffled' at mistaken release of jailed Epping migrant
"And I feel like I was put in danger all over again and all of the feelings from the day it happened came back.
"We found out he was being deported, and I was being told by everybody that he got paid £500.
"When I got home I just cried because I felt like he got paid for what he had done to me."
The girl, who was 14 at the time of the assault, added: "I didn't want to be in Epping because I was so scared I was going to see him and he would recognise me."
Kebatu had been living at the Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex, when he sexually assaulted the girl and a woman, sparking a wave of protests outside the accommodation used to house asylum seekers.
His trial heard he had made inappropriate comments to a 14-year-old girl before trying to kiss her on July 7, just eight days after his arrival in the UK.
The following day, Kebatu sexually assaulted a woman by attempting to kiss her, placing his hand on her leg, and telling her she was "pretty."
He denied the charges against him but was found guilty of five offences and sentenced in September to 12 months in custody, including the time he had already spent in jail awaiting his trial.
Kebatu was then wrongly freed from HMP Chelmsford last month instead of being sent to an immigration detention centre, triggering a two-day manhunt.
The Ethiopian national was forcibly removed to his home country on October 28 with a team of five escorts on the flight, and arrived on Wednesday morning with no right to return to Britain, the Home Office said.
A spokesperson for the girl's father previously told LBC that hearing about his release was "incredibly difficult for the family."
They added: "She's having counselling and she's been sort of starting to progress gradually, get her confidence back and then to find out her attacker was just freely walking the streets as a result of a police error?
"It's set her back. It's really frightened her. She feared bumping into him along the high street and him recognising her."