INFAMOUS serial rapist Robert John Fardon is to remain locked up - but only until such time as a judge can reconsider if he should be set free.
The Court of Appeal in Brisbane on Thursday morning granted Queensland Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie's application to overturn a Supreme Court judge's decision to release Fardon back into the community under strict supervision.
It is the second time the government has successfully mounted challenges in Queensland's highest court to overturn court rulings that the 64-year-old was fit for supervised release.
However, the court ordered the matter be returned to Supreme Court immediately to consider fresh evidence before deciding if he should be released under strict supervision or stay in prison indefinitely.
In a majority 2-1 decision, Justice John Muir said the Dangerous Prisoners (Sex Offenders) Act required a judge to give detailed reasons when making an order for detention or supervised release.
"This requirement include enabling the parties and the public to understand the judge's reasons for making such an order so as to provide 'the foundation for the acceptability of the decision by the parties and by the public'," he said.
"There was an insufficiency of reasons both for the purposes of (the Act) and under the general law."
Justice Muir, backed by Justice Robertson Gotterson, also ordered Fardon's case be immediately remitted for a fresh hearing.
He said whether Fardon should be released on not should be decided by weighing evidence from two psychiatrists and any other evidence.
"This is an exercise which can best be undertaken by a judge of the trial division who will have the benefit of seeing and hearing the witnesses," he said.
"For the above reasons I would the (A-G's) appeal be allowed ... and that the matter be remitted to the trial division for re-hearing."
Justice Roslyn Atkinson, in a dissenting judgment, said Mr Bleijie had failed to show any error in the decision to release Fardon and that she would have dismissed the appeal.
Mr Bleijie last month appealed a decision by Justice Debra Mullins that Fardon be released from his indefinite jail sentence under the state's Dangerous Prisoners (Sexual Offenders) Act and be subjected to a list of very onerous conditions.
Justice Mullins six weeks ago found the rapist remained a "serious danger to the community" in the absence of an ongoing supervision order, but rescinded an order requiring his continued detention since July 1, 2011.
She found Fardon could be adequately managed in the community order with 34 conditions, including that he notify authorities of any intimate relationship, not visit any place were children of people with intellectual disabilities resided, abstained from alcohol, obey a curfew and wear a GPS tracking device.
Fardon's immediate release was promptly blocked when Mr Bleijie was granted a stay by Justice John Muir pending an appeal.
A hearing to decide Fardon's fate four weeks ago was told the reviled sex offender was planning to live in the community, rather than an area set aside to house dangerous sex offenders, if and when he won his freedom.
The state's Solicitor-General Walter Sofronoff, QC, for Mr Bleijie, said Fardon had an incurable psychopathic personality disorder and should remain locked up indefinitely until he completes a sex offender treatment program.
In June 2003, Fardon, then aged 54, became the first person detained indefinitely - having already served the full-term of his prison sentence - under Queensland's then controversial Dangerous Prisoners (Sexual Offenders) Act.
Fardon has so far spent all but five years of his adult life in jail for sexual offences against women and children.
Fardon's immediate release was promptly blocked when Queensland Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie was granted a stay by Justice John Muir pending an appeal.
Fardon hit a similar hurdle in May 2011 when then Labor Attorney-General Paul Lucas lodged an appeal against a decision by then Acting Supreme Court judge Julie Dick to grant Fardon conditional release.
Mr Lucas's appeal, assuring Fardon's continued indefinite incarceration, was granted when Chief Justice Paul de Jersey, sitting in the Court of Appeal, said the substantial concern was Fardon's demonstrated unwillingness to submit fully to a supervised regime.
He was released under a strict supervision order in 2006 but was detained two years later after being apprehended, charged and then convicted of rape.
Fardon was jailed for 10-years for the rape in 2010, but the conviction was quashed on appeal.
Fardon has so far spent all but five years of his adult life in jail for sexual offences against women and children.
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