October 2017: Twist has now been released back to Letchworth

April 2012

Appeal Court judges back paedophile sentence

A sadistic pervert who downloaded child sexual abuse images and blackmailed a nine-year-old into indulging his sick fantasies via a webcam had his potentially lifelong sentence backed by top judges

David Robert Reed Twist, 20, of St Andrews Court, Biggleswade, was caged indefinitely for public protection at Cambridge Crown Court in September last year.

He was hit with the sentence – reserved for dangerous offenders and almost identical to a life term – after he admitted inciting a child to engage in sexual activity and counts of making and distributing indecent pictures of children.

Twist was prosecuted after police raided his home in September 2010, London’s Appeal Court heard, discovering over 1,000 indecent images on his computer. Further investigations revealed a web ‘chat log’ disclosing Twist’s communication with a nine-year-old girl via a webcam.

September 2011

‘Vile’ Letchworth paedophile jailed indefinitely

A SADISTIC paedophile was jailed indefinitely today (Friday) and has been warned he may never be fit for release.

David Twist, of Burnell Rise, Letchworth GC, will serve a minimum of four years in a young offenders’ institution after pleading guilty to 26 offences between January 2009 and September 2010, the most serious of which was inciting a child of nine to engage in sexual activity.

Judge Gareth Hawkesworth branded the perverted ways of the 20-year-old as “vile” at Cambridge Crown Court before adding: “It’s quite impossible at this stage to predict when, if at all, you will be safe to be released into the community.”

Mr Hawkesworth said Twist had been diagnosed by a psychiatrist as a sadist, who also said that he met the criteria for paedophilia after more than 1,000 indecent images were found on Twist’s laptop at his parent’s home.

Following his arrest on September 17 last year, Twist was charged with inciting a child of nine to engage in sexual activity; four offences of distributing indecent images, to likeminded individuals as well as to the nine-year-old; two of taking indecent images; 16 of making indecent images; two of possessing indecent images; and one of possessing extreme pornographic images, of intercourse with a dog and a horse.

The court heard how Twist forced a nine-year-old girl, through a combination of threats and promises, to perform sexual acts between May and August 2010 via social networking sites MSN and Facebook, in which he pretended to be someone called Sarah May.

Mr Hawkesworth told the court: “You have admitted you enjoyed exercising control, in particular over the victim of nine.

“After having performed indecent sexual acts for you on webcam the evidence shows you humiliated her through blackmail, coercing her to perform acts on the webcam against her wishes and under duress.

“Although you were not physically present, the offence is gravely aggravated by the threats and the fact that you were able to move from viewing indecent images to influencing a girl in the real world in that way highlights the risk you pose to others.”

Prosecutor Sara Walker said: “He uploaded one picture of her on the internet. She’s asked him to stop and he has threatened to send them off unless she did what he told her. The girl responds ‘OK I do as you say then, please don’t upload pictures of me’.

“Officers went to her home and identified her by a picture recovered from the defendant’s computer which was shown to her mother and she was able to confirm it was her nine-year-old daughter. She was spoken to and she would not tell officers anything.”

Twist began his “perverted conduct” when he was 17, with images and video recovered showing boys and girls aged between two and 14.

In addition to putting Twist behind bars, the judge also ordered that he should sign the sex offenders’ register for life and made a sexual offences prevention order which included limiting his internet access and it being monitored.