A STEPFATHER and local youth group worker convicted of cruelty to twin boys was jailed for two years on Friday.

The 45-year-old, together with the boys’ 38-year-old mother, subjected them to months of abuse that included them being beaten, starved of food, locked in a shed and made to sleep on a wooden bed covered with just a piece of carpet.

On another occasion, the stepfather also wet his fist before punching one of the teenagers in the eye, leaving it swollen and bloodshot, during a row over missing money.

Maidstone Crown Court heard that the Gillingham couple, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, treated their other children well. The abuse of the boys was discovered when they ran away from home in April last year.

Ironically, the stepfather, who maintains his innocence, played a pivotal role in setting up a youth group, but the boys did not attend.

Jailing him for a total of two years Judge Jeremy Carey said: "It is significant that two of the potential beneficiaries of that youth club never went there. You said they didn’twant to. My assessment is you didn’t want them to."

The couple had each denied 14 charges of cruelty to a person under 16.

He was convicted of seven charges and she, now pregnant with her seventh child, was convicted of six.

The court heard that the boys had behavioural problems and the parents had contacted social services.

But Judge Carey said there was no excuse for the cruelty between February 2001 and April 2004.

"I have no doubt that their behaviour was from time to time extremely vexing for you. In that respect, as parents, you are not alone," he said.

"But it would never be a justification for the kind of treatment you meted out to those two boys."

Judge Carey said there were exceptional circumstances enabling him to suspend the mother’s 18-month prison sentence for two years.

These included her pregnancy, her children and that her behaviour was influenced by her husband.