The jailed rapist mayor who is still being paid

A FORMER town mayor convicted of raping a schoolgirl is still receiving his taxpayerfunded salary while in prison, it emerged yesterday.

David Boswell, 58, was jailed for 18 years last month over a series of historic sex attacks against two girls under the age of nine, one of whom he raped.

Yet incredibly, the former mayor of Pembroke, West Wales, is still receiving his £1,133-a-month salary while behind bars.

That is because of council rules which mean that Boswell can continue to be paid for the next three months while he awaits the outcome of an appeal against his conviction.

The decision was heavily criticised by the NSPCC children’s charity yesterday.

The Welsh Local Government Association admitted the situation was a ‘legal anomaly’, but added: ‘A guilty verdict does mean an automatic disqualification, following a 28-day window for a possible appeal.’

Boswell, a former soldier and lorry driver, was elected as a county councillor in May last year. He was the serving mayor when charged in August, at which point he stood down from mayoral duties and was suspended by the Conservative Party.

A court heard Boswell raped and indecently assaulted one of the girls and indecently assaulted the other in a string of sex attacks in the early 1990s. ‘Gross abuse of trust’: Boswell A spokesman for the NSPCC said: ‘Boswell was convicted of appalling sex offences against children and it is right he now faces many years behind bars where he cannot harm others. It is wrong that someone convicted of sexual crimes against children can continue to serve as an elected official for any period of time.

‘We support a change to the law to ensure situations like this are not repeated.’

A spokesman for the Welsh Local Government Association said: ‘The issue in question is a legal anomaly in the current framework that needs to be urgently addressed.

‘A guilty verdict does mean an automatic disqualification, following a 28- day window for a possible appeal.

‘This is where the problem is located and needs urgent review, especially as this deplorable offence is a fundamental breach of the statutory duty councillors have to ensure all children in local authority areas are safeguarded and protected.’ Boswell denied the allegations, saying they were ‘ complete lies’, and urged police to make him take a lie detector test. But jurors at Swansea Crown Court found him guilty of four counts of indecent assault and one count of rape.

Boswell – who served in the Army for more than 12 years and is a marshal for the Royal British Legion – committed the attacks between 1991 and 1994.

He was jailed for 18 years and told he must serve an extra two on licence. He was also handed a sexual harm prevention order and a restraining order preventing him from contacting children under the age of 16.

Judge Keith Thomas said: ‘This was a gross abuse of trust. The children were particularly vulnerable because of their extreme youth.’