January 2012

Police arrest convicted paedophile who went on the run

A convicted paedophile who went on the run after spending the last 47 years in custody was yesterday arrested in Penzance.

David Marker, 75, sparked the police hunt after vanishing from a hospital unit in Taunton.

He was detained at 11am yesterday, although Avon and Somerset Police, who were conducting the search, refused to say where he was found and the circumstances under which he was arrested.

A spokesman for the force said he would be taken back to a secure hospital facility.

Marker was detained indefinitely in April 1965 for an indecent assault on a seven-year-old girl and has been in custody ever since.

In May 1998 he gave two guards the slip during an escorted visit to a swimming pool at Abraham Moss Leisure Centre in Crumpsall, Manchester. He was on the run for around 48 hours. It was revealed that he had also escaped just months before that incident when he was on the run for ten days, hiding out in a town 30 miles from York. He was able to create a false identity, and had tried to claim benefit payments before he was caught.