Young offender in security row

Adam was missing for five days before Lorraine was told

The parents of a Kent teenager who absconded from a young offenders' institute say his disappearance has raised serious security issues.

Lorraine and Michael Adach also criticised staff at Huntercombe Young Offenders' Institution in Oxfordshire, for not telling them Adam Crawford, 17, had been missing for five days.

Adam, from Sittingbourne, was on an unaccompanied daytrip to find somewhere to live on his release when he went missing on 16 October.

His mother and stepfather left him at Sittingbourne Railway Station, but he failed to catch his train back to Nuffield, south Oxfordshire.

Runaway diary 16 October: Adam Crawford absconds 21 October: Adam's parents are told 28 October: Police stop Adam but let him go 29 October: Adam is taken back to the institute

Mr and Mrs Adach were told on 21 October he was missing.

Adam was then stopped by police in Gravesend on 28 October in connection with an unrelated incident, but they let him go.

Mr Adach said: "The police let him slip through their fingers. It is a lack of communication in a failing system which is supposed to be there to safeguard against these things."

The teenager, who was coming to the end of a nine-month sentence for car related offences, contacted his parents after 13 days on the run and they drove him back to the institute.

Adam, who was due to be released at the end of October, has had his sentence increased by a month.

Kent Police confirmed they had received a letter of complaint from Mr and Mrs Adach and said a full investigation was under way.

The Home Office said Adam's Youth Offending Team should have contacted his parents to let them know he was missing as the institute did not have their number.

Huntercombe's governor has apologised for any upset caused.