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Convicted sex offender cuts off monitor, escapes Colo. group home

DENVER, Colo - Police are on the hunt for a convicted child sex criminal who they say walked away from a Denver halfway house, reports CBS Denver.

Eric Hartwell, 51, a registered sex offender, apparently cut off his GPS tracking ankle monitor before escaping Independence House, a community corrections facility in Denver, reports the Denver Post.

Hartwell is wanted on a nationwide felony warrant for “parole violation sex assault,” the Denver Police Department reported via Twitter. The state Department of Corrections requested the warrant on Friday evening, 22 minutes after Hartwell's ankle monitor "was apparently removed," a DOC spokeswoman told the Post.

The 51-year-old was convicted of molesting  a six-year-old in Washington State in 1991 and for attempted rape of a 15-year-old hitchhiker in 1995, CBS Denver reports.

Hartwell has at least four convictions for failing to register as a sex offender, reports the Denver Post.



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