A DARTMOOR Prison inmate is facing an even longer sentence after admitting abusing two girls in the 1970s.

Former lorry driver David Milton is already serving a 15-year sentence for historic sexual assaults on two other girls but will now have his sentence extended.

He was living in Newton Abbot in the 1970s and 1980s when he committed all the offences, all of which involved grooming and taking advantage of  children.

He was jailed for the first time in April 2017  after being found guilty of 11 offences of indecency against one girl and one against the second. He was sentenced in his absence after trying to take his own life the day before that hearing.

He is currently serving his sentence at HMP Dartmoor, which has a special wing to house sex offenders. He was brought to Exeter Crown Court where he was due to be tried for the new allegations.

He changed his plea to guilty after Judge David Evans ruled that the jury in his trial would be told about the earlier offences because they were committed around the same time and were very similar in nature.

Milton, aged 83, formerly of Howards Way, Newton Abbot, admitted indecently assaulting against one girl four times and the other girl once. All the offences took place in the late 1970s.

Judge David Evans adjourned sentence until July 20 to give the defence time to obtain an up-to-date report on Milton’s poor health.

Mr Herc Ashworth, defending, said he would be entering a basis of plea in which Milton will deny plying the girls with alcohol before abusing them.

Judge Evans said the issue would make little difference to sentence as there are other aggravating features which elevate it to the highest level of culpability.

He said there was no need for a probation report because Milton is already in prison but that he would have to consider the issue of totality, meaning that he will have to take into account the length of his existing sentence in deciding the length of the new one.

In the 2017 case, Milton denied any sexual contact with two other girls but was found guilty by a jury. 

One of those victims gave evidence that she was so young and innocent when he abused her that she only realised the seriousness of his actions when she went to sex education lessons at school.

All the offences were committed when Milton was living in an estate near Newton Abbot in the 1970s and 1980s. The prosecution described him as having ‘an insatiable appetite for young children and no inhibitions at all’.

They said he brainwashed the victims and assaulted one of the girls while babysitting. He bullied the girls into keeping his abuse secret by telling them they would be taken into care if they told anyone what he was doing.