ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — Convicted sex offender Matthew Twyne has been charged with committing an indecent act the day he was arrested last month.
Twyne, 33, had finished a two-and-a-half-year sentence and had been out of jail for two days when he was arrested Oct. 11 by RNC officers responding to a report of an indecent act in the area of Long Pond in St. John's. Though Twyne was not charged with that crime at that moment, he was charged with two counts of breaching a court order given to him upon his release, namely that he stay away from the area surrounding Memorial University. Long Pond is located in the vicinity of MUN.
Twyne waived his right to a bail hearing and has been in custody ever since. In the meantime, police continued their investigation into the indecent act and appealed to members of the public who may have witnessed it to come forward.
Twyne was charged with the crime this week.
Lawyer Tim O'Brien represented Twyne when his case was called in provincial court in St. John's Thursday. It was postponed until later in the month.
Twyne, whose criminal history includes six convictions for indecent acts, has been deemed by police and the parole board to be at a significant risk to reoffend. With concerns that he would commit another sexual offence, but having no grounds to keep him in custody, the RNC successfully applied to the provincial court, when Twyne's recent sentence was completed, for an order compelling him to abide by dozens of conditions upon his release.
There were 29 conditions, including that he have no contact with children and that he stay away from a handful of specific locations in the metro area.
Twyne’s criminal record consists of 73 convictions since 2005 in Corner Brook, Stephenville and St. John’s, the most recent in August 2017. He received a federal jail sentence for an incident in which he went to a St. John’s dance school, returned twice after he was told to leave and at one point pressed his bare penis against a window in an area where young teenage dancers were gathered. When he was arrested, he was found to be intoxicated and carrying a hunting knife.
Twitter: @tara_bradbury
