B.C. sex offender pleads guilty to breaching supervision order following manhunt

VANCOUVER — A high-risk sex offender who went on the run for 10 days in Vancouver has pleaded guilty to breaching his long-term supervision order and failing to attend court. 

The province's prosecution service confirmed that Randall Hopley entered the guilty pleas in provincial court on Friday.

Hopley walked away from a halfway house in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside after cutting off his ankle monitor in November.

The public manhunt ended when investigators said Hopley turned up outside a police station to give himself up because he was feeling cold.

Hopley had completed a six-year prison term for the 2011 abduction of a three-year-old boy in southeastern B.C.

He was released in 2018 to live in a halfway house under a 10-year supervision order, but was arrested in January for allegedly violating conditions of the order by visiting a library and getting too close to children. 

He was on bail for that charge when he disappeared.

Hopley is expected to be in court next month to schedule a date for a sentencing hearing.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 26, 2024.

The Canadian Press