SWASH:SEXUAL PREDATOR LOCKED UP FOR ATTACKING TWO WOMEN IN ONE NIGHT
A knife wielding sexual predator who attacked two women in one night of terror was locked up indefinitely to protect the public today (Weds).
Joe Swash, 21, grabbed his first victim by the thigh as she walked home along a dark pathway in east London.
The woman managed to escape his clutches after they were disturbed by a passing cyclist, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard.
Hours later, Swash held a pocket knife to the ribs of another young woman and told her ‘I just want sex.’
When she refused, he said: ‘Why don’t you just touch my piece and I’ll let you go. No one has to know.’
Swash later said he attacked one of the women because she was ‘stupid’, adding: ‘She was lucky, as I was going to rob her as well.’
Judge William Kennedy ordered he be detained indefinitely for the protection of the public and recommended he serve at least four years jail before he can be released.
The judge said: ‘You are a person who represents a high risk to the public of the commotion of further offences of great seriousness.’
The court heard Swash had approached the first woman at around 7.45pm on the evening of 12 October last year on a pathway by Cheverell House off the Hackney Road in Bethnal Green.
He initially grabbed her inside leg from behind and took both her wrists and pulled her towards him as soon as she turned round.
It took several minutes for her to free herself, and she was only able to run into a nearby building after a cyclist disturbed Swash.
The judge said: ‘The victim was very shaken up and upset by your behaviour, and feels, in my view entirely reasonably, that had you not been disturbed, you may well have gone on to commit further serious offences against her.’
At 11.45 the same night, Swash started following another woman down Dace Road in Hackney Wick, before taking her arm and making a grab for her throat in nearby Stour Road.
She tried to resist, grabbing his throat and pushing him against a wall, but he responded by pulling out a knife.
He ran off after she began screaming and a car drove past, leading to police being called and picking him up nearby.
On arrest, Swash became ‘extremely violent’ and told police that he would ‘loose it’ and ‘smash their noses in’, the court heard.
He later told officers: ‘If she is f***ing saying I was sexually harassing her then I want that bitch done for grabbing me round the throat.’
Swash later admitted two sexual assaults and possession of a Stanley knife in public.
Psychiatrists found that he suffers from a ‘dissocial’ personality disorder and was highly likely to commit further offences in the future.
The judge told him: ‘Your lack of any real appreciation of either the nature of your acts or their effect upon your victims is evident.’
He ruled that an indeterminate spell in prison was the ‘only appropriate sentence’ so as to protect the public.
Swash, of (40) Clyde Road, Wood Green, north London, was handed a minimum term of three years for the first sexual assault and four years for the second, both to run concurrently.
He was given a further nine months for the possession of a knife, also to run concurrently, and must also sign the sex offenders register for an indefinite period.
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