Leigh Rapist: A13 attacker Richard Baker denied parole

Richard Baker is not safe to be released from prison, a Parole Board has ruled.

Baker was jailed in 1999 for a string of rapes and other sex crimes.

Over the course of eight months the then 33-year-old attacked young women and girls in London, Essex and Sussex – threatening to kill them if they called the police.

Baker, from Bodmin in Cornwall, attacked a 15-year-old girl in Leigh in August 1998, and another teenage girl in the Queensway underpass just a few weeks later.

On the same day as the second attack, he seriously sexually assaulted a 21-year-old woman in Beedell Avenue, Westcliff.

Baker wept when he was handed four life sentences for his crimes.

Richard Baker

A judge described him as “depraved and wicked” and a danger to women.

In 2016, another six years was added to his sentence for possessing and making indecent images of children.

After a hearing last month taking evidence from officials, medical experts and victims, the Parole Board decided it was “not satisfied that Mr Baker was suitable for release”.

A document detailing the decision said: “Although Mr Baker’s prison conduct had been generally good, there was also broad agreement amongst all the witnesses that he was not yet suitable to be released on licence.

“And he was not recommended for transfer to an open prison.”

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Although he had taken part in work to address his behaviour while in jail, it was decided more work was “necessary” as there had been “little progress” since the last review.

Now 56, this is the third time Baker has been reviewed by the Board and he has already spent an extra nine years behind bars.

He will be eligible for another parole review in due course.