The criminal justice system has been castigated for its sloppy and “nonchalant” approach, which contributed to the fatal stabbing of an innocent man on a London bus by a criminal on bail.

A report into the death of Richard Whelan, 28, on a bus after he tried to stop Anthony Joseph throwing chips at his girlfriend has blamed a culture of “apparent acceptance” to the breaching of bail conditions. Joseph was repeatedly bailed to non-existent addresses. The attack happened hours after he was released from prison.

The damning report by four criminal justice watchdogs condemns a lax attitude among officials in the courts, probation and police to enforcing bail conditions, as well as to the committing of offences on bail. “What we have found is what may best be described as a lackadaisical or nonchalant approach within the CJS [criminal justice system] to many routine aspects of the handling of cases”, it says.

The “cumulative effect” of that led to a sequence of events culminating in the death of Mr Whelan on July 29, 2005, the report says.

Joseph stabbed Mr Whelan, a hospitality agent from Kentish Town, North London, seven times, including once through the heart, after he tried to stop Joseph throwing chips at his girlfriend.

The joint report by the four inspectorates of the Crown Prosecution Service, Constabulary and Prisons found that there was no single act or omission that could be blamed for the “tragic” fatal stabbing of Mr Whelan.

There was nothing in the history of offending by Joseph, also known as Anthony Peart, that should have alerted the criminal justice authorities to the fact that he was a man “capable of extreme spontaneous violence”. But the report finds “too ready an acceptance of the commission of offences while on bail, insufficient rigour in respect of checking the validity of proposed bail conditions, and an apparent acceptance of the continual breach of bail conditions”. It adds: “The lack of diligence in verifying suggested bail conditions, scant evidence of enforcement of those conditions and a failure to deal effectively with breaches when they occurred, all contributed to events taking the course they did.”

Joseph was sent to Broadmoor secure hospital in December 2007. He had admitted manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility after being formally acquitted of murder when two trials failed to produce verdicts.

The incident, on the top deck of a No 43 bus in North London, took place hours after Joseph’s release from prison in July 2005. He was freed despite a warrant being out for his arrest over an alleged burglary. Merseyside Police, which was investigating the burglary, did not know that Joseph had been in custody because a computer system had not been updated.

The report said that ministers should consider giving prisons “enhanced access” to the Police National Computer. It notes that the same recommendation was made in 2006 by the inquiry into the racist murder of the inmate Zahid Mubarek at Feltham Young Offender Institution. However, there are still only 46 jails with access to data from the police computer.

Joseph was repeatedly bailed to a non-existent address in Camden, North London, by magistrates. The inspectors found no evidence that the authorities had checked whether the address was suitable or even genuine.

Joseph, 23, had nine convictions between 2001 and the year of the manslaughter. None was for violent crime, although there was one for possessing an offensive weapon.

Vera Baird, QC, the Solicitor-General, said that a working group had been set up to examine the recommendations but most of them would be accepted. “The Government very much regrets the death of Richard Whelan and thanks the chief inspectors for their work. We are determined to learn lessons from this,” she said.

A Crown Court judge hit out yesterday over community sentences. Judge Peter Jacobs’s comments came as he reviewed an order given to an offender who had not satisfactorily completed part of the sentence. “I just despair of the number of these community orders that just don’t work,” the judge said when reviewing at Norwich Crown Court the order given to David Neal, 19, who had been convicted of a string of offences. He added: “Judges like me are put in between a rock and a hard place. We are told prisons are full . . . and the reality is we bend over backwards to give these community orders and too often they don’t work.”

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