A Brisbane mother has spoken for the first time about her concerns regarding childcare safety after an alleged incident involving her three-year-old daughter and the man now accused of being Australia’s worst ever paedophile.
Ashley Paul Griffith has been charged with more than 1600 child sex offences against 91 children over a 15-year period but was cleared by Queensland Police of two separate complaints in the 12 months prior to his arrest.
Detectives did not even interview Griffith about the second complaint involving the three-year-old girl and did not refer either investigation to Blue Card Services, which could potentially have led to restrictions being placed on his ability to work with children.
“How on earth, a man who is reported on two completely different incidents in different daycare centres is then free to work in another daycare centre?” said “Kym”, a pseudonym to protect the identity of her daughter.
“I don’t understand that. That’s probably what has me the most upset.”
Kym claims her daughter repeated what she told her parents but became confused when she was given a teddy bear to show where he’d allegedly touched her.
Police determined there was not enough evidence to continue the investigation.
“The detective did say to me afterwards, ‘I’ve been doing this for a really long time, I deal with a lot of children who have been interfered with and your daughter doesn’t seem like a child who has been interfered with’,” Kym said.
The investigation was handled by the Child Protection and Investigation Unit at Boondall Police station, which had also investigated a previous complaint against Griffith around six months earlier.
That October 2021 report came from a childcare teacher who alleged she’d seen Griffith kiss a young girl whilst sleeping.
It had occurred at a different Brisbane childcare centre, run by the Uniting Church, which was also dismissed by police.
It was only after new Queensland laws unmasking accused sex offenders came into effect three weeks ago that Kym discovered the teacher her daughter complained about was the same man accused of being Australia’s worst ever paedophile.