Corrections Minister Judith Collins says she is pleased with the result of an inquiry released today that cleared her department of any blame for Blessie Gotingco's death.
Ms Collins says the report reinforced that the only person who needed to be held responsible for Ms Gotingco's murder was her killer, convicted sex offender Tony Douglas Robertson.
However the report also gave a total of 27 recommendations to the Corrections Department about what they could improve -- improvements Ms Collins says would not "have made a scrap of difference".
"This was an opportunistic attempt by a very vicious killer to run down, rape, stab and kill Mrs Gotingco and then dump her body -- so nothing would have helped," Ms Collins explained.
"Unfortunately we can't prevent every single offender who is absolutely determined to commit a heinous crime -- if we could do that we wouldn't have the jails that we have."
When asked whether we should just accept that serious crimes will inevitably occur, Ms Collins responded by saying that "unless you wanted a police officer handcuffed to a criminal, that is unfortunately what happens".
"If it was not Mrs Gotingco, then I firmly believe that it would have been another innocent person [targeted by Mr Robertson]," she said.
Newshub.
