David Challenor, 50, was jailed for 22 years on Monday after subjecting a 10-year-old girl to an horrific campaign of abuse. His attacks included whipping her and giving her electric shocks
These chilling images show the ‘torture den’ attic where a twisted pervert held a 10-year-old girl captive while playing out his sadomasochistic fantasies.
Evil David Challenor, 50, was jailed for 22 years on Monday after being convicted of subjecting the youngster to a horrific campaign of abuse.
A court heard the twisted thug would dress up as a small girl in adult-sized baby dresses and nappies before carrying out the sickening attacks at his home.
They included tying his victim from a beam, whipping her and giving her electric shocks.
Police searched his property and found bondage gear including sex aids, gaffer tape, dummies, a stun gun and ropes hanging from the beam in his sex dungeon-style attic.
He even took trophy photographs of the abuse carried out on the 10-year-old girl which included attaching clips to give her electric shocks and putting pegs on her body.
Today the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) released photographs of the loft where he carried out his depraved acts.
In one photo a red dress can clearly be seen on a coat hanger in the cluttered attic while another shows ropes and chains hanging from the beams.
Today the Crown Prosecution service released photographs of the loft where Challenor carried out his depraved acts. In one photo a red dress can clearly be seen on a coat hanger in the cluttered attic
Another picture shows ropes and chains hanging from the beams. Challenor would tie his victim from a beam. He would also whip her and give her electric shocks
A picture released by the Crown Prosecution Service today shows a tool box found in Challenor’s loft filled with whips, ropes, candles and lotions
Challenor would bring his 10-year-old victim to an attic where he would tie her up, whip her and give her electric shocks
Others show a tool box filled with whips, ropes, candles and lotions.
Married Challenor accused the girl of being a liar and a fantasist when he was arrested – but officers found the gruesome attic kitted out just as she had described.
Despite the damning evidence he pleaded not guilty to charges including false imprisonment, rape, gross indecency, assault by penetration, indecent assault and assault causing her actual bodily harm.
Challenor, of Coventry, also denied taking indecent images of her, making indecent images of children by downloading them, and possessing prohibited images.
But after nine hours at the end of an 11-day trial the jury at Warwick Crown Court unanimously found him guilty of all but one of the charges of taking indecent images.
Sentencing on Monday, Recorder Nicholas Syfret QC said: ‘It is hard to comprehend how you could behave with such depravity.
‘The harm done by you to her is hard to overestimate.’
Prosecutor Andrew Wallace said most of the charges related to the ordeal to which Challenor subjected the girl.
He told jurors: ‘The defendant will call her a fantasist and a liar about the allegations, but she made them before the police went to the defendant’s house and made a search.’
Mr Wallace said Challenor had ‘various sexual fetishes and fantasies’ including dressing up as a small girl himself.
Pretending to be a little girl called Lucy, when the victim was at his home he took her to the attic where he asked her ‘to do things to him’ including performing oral sex.
After leaving, she was initially too frightened to tell anyone what he had done – but eventually did so.
David Challenor pictured outside Warwick Crown Court. He was sentenced to 22 years in jail on Monday and ordered to register as a sex offender for life
She confided in someone what had happened, which was reported to the police who interviewed her towards the end of 2015.
When he was arrested, Challenor denied the offences and claimed the girl was ‘a fantasist.’
During the trial, Mr Wallace asked: ‘So what are the chances that the police on a later date find whips and various things at his house?
‘These are not things that are routinely in the knowledge of a child – so when the police go to the address and find items there which support that, that will help you decide “is she the liar or is Mr Challenor?”
‘Just the kind of things she talked about being used on her are there. She hasn’t invented them, they are there.’
In addition, on a memory card in a digital camera were indecent images, including some of that girl, which Challenor denied being responsible for taking.
And on another device were indecent images of children which had been downloaded from the internet.
Challenor described in court the supposedly legitimate uses of each of the items found in the attic, as did his wife – but their accounts of what they were for did not always tally.
After the jury returned its verdicts, Mr Wallace read out an impact statement in which Challenor’s victim said she had been left traumatised by her ordeal.
Robert Sandford, defending, said: ‘She is damaged, I make no issue about that.’
He said Challenor, who has medical issues, has been the full-time carer for his wife, who attended court in a wheelchair and was now unlikely to be able to remain in their home.
Challenor was jailed for 19 years for the offences against the girl, with a consecutive three-year term for the images, and was ordered to register as a sex offender for life.