UK paedophile gets life for Malaysia abuse

Judge Peter Rook handed Richard Huckle, 22 life sentences to be served concurrently after he pleaded guilty to 71 counts of child sex offences.

Huckle, 30, held his hands together in prayer as the judge delivered his sentence, and remained impassive as his punishment was announced.

A woman in the public gallery leapt to her feet and shouted “a thousand deaths is too good for you” as Huckle was led out of court.

Rook said Huckle had almost certainly “blighted the lives of his victims forever”.The prolific offender has already spent 488 days in jail, so faces more than 23 years behind bars before a parole board can consider his release. 

Among the admitted offences were 22 charges of rape against children he groomed while posing as a volunteer working with Christian communities in the Malaysian capital.

“Relentlessly you preyed on the very young. You targeted and groomed impoverished children,” said Rook.

Huckle posted pictures of the abuse of boys and girls on website True Love Zone (TLZ), with the youngest victim believed to have been around six months old. He was eventually snared by an Australian investigation into the site.

British police arrested Huckle, from Kent in southeast England, at London Gatwick Airport in December 2014 as he returned home from Malaysia to spend Christmas with his parents.

He was carrying a heavily-encrypted computer and camera that contained over 20,0000 images of child sex abuse, over 1,000 of which showed him committing offences including rape.

Huckle handed the judge a note before sentencing today pleading for leniency and his defence argued in mitigation that he had not inflicted any physical pain on his victims, a claim the judge dismissed.

“I’ve been shown some of the video footage and I’m sure that your action caused immediate pain and distress,” said Rook. “Others were passive, having been groomed into submission.”