DES MOINES – A former Waterloo teacher who invited students into his home to make up assignments by playing kinky games has lost his second appeal in the case.
Larry David Twigg, age 57, was convicted of five counts of lascivious conduct with a minor for acts involving one of his students. He was sentenced after his 2013 trial to two years in prison.
Twigg appealed his convictions and sentences, alleging that sufficient evidence did not support his convictions as to four counts and also the weight of the evidence does not support his conviction as to the final count.
The Iowa Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction and the sentences in a ruling released this week.
Twigg, now lives in Des Moines and is a registered sex offender. Â He has been convicted once already of violating the Iowa sex offender registry.
According to court documents, Twigg engaged in some seriously kinky misconduct with a male student.
In December 2009, Larry Twigg invited D.W., a seventeen-year-old high school student, to his house. D.W. was behind on some of his assignments for Twigg’s computer class. Twigg told him that he could either complete the assignments or play a video game. For each level D.W. beat on the game, he would receive credit for one assignment; for each level he lost, he would have to take off a piece of clothing.
D.W. chose to play the game. He had lost four levels and was wearing only his boxers when Twigg left the room. While he was gone, D.W. searched online to learn how to beat the game. When Twigg returned, he noticed D.W. was doing better. D.W. admitted he cheated, and Twigg told him that he would have to come back.
D.W. returned to Twigg’s home in January 2010. The rules of the game were somewhat different. This time, in order to avoid taking off a piece of clothing, D.W. could instead choose an activity from a list Twigg provided. After losing several levels, and articles of clothing, D.W. started picking activities from the list. The first was called “cold change,” which required D.W. to go into Twigg’s garage by himself and change from one pair of boxers to another. Another task required D.W. to complete a set of exercises wearing only a towel. At that point, D.W. had beat enough levels on the game to make up his assignments. But he still owed Twigg money for a cell phone bill that Twigg had paid for him. Twigg offered to give D.W. money to deduct from his debt if he completed other items on the list. Those remaining tasks were described by D.W. as follows:
[S]ix boxers which . . . involve[d] me in only my boxers laying on the bed and receiving six spankings, three whoppers, which would involve me bending over the bed butt naked and getting three spankings. The snow angels, which basically involved me doing two snow angels in my boxers, one on my front and one on my back. And des[s]ert mix, which involved me getting into the bathtub and letting him pour pineapple sauce, chocolate sauce, eggs, flour, milk, and two different kinds of candy on me.
D.W. chose the six boxers, snow angels, and dessert mix. Once he performed those tasks, Twigg drove him home. D.W. told two of his friends what had happened. One of them told the high school principal, and Twigg’s conduct was reported to the police.
Twigg was interviewed by a representative from the school district and the police. He admitted to having done everything described by D.W., stating he “thought this was a way to motivate the student to do better.” Twigg apologized for his behavior, acknowledging, “This is a stupid thing I did. It was a mistake and I am sorry.”
After Twigg’s arrest, two of his former students, J.F. and A.W., came forward with similar claims. J.F. stated that in 1995, when he was fifteen years old, Twigg hired him to do some work at his house. Once the work was finished, Twigg asked him if he would be interested in doubling his money. J.F. said yes. Twigg had J.F. take his clothes off and get into the shower. He then cracked eggs over him and poured chocolate syrup on him. On a second occasion in 1996, Twigg again offered to pay J.F. if he would allow Twigg to pour chocolate syrup on him in the shower. J.F. agreed. He said that both times, Twigg told him that he was trying to teach him “a life lesson in humility.”
A.W. said that in the summer of 2009, after his high school graduation, Twigg contacted him. He asked A.W. to come over to his house to make up some points from one of Twigg’s classes. A.W. agreed. Like he had with D.W., Twigg told A.W. that he could make up the points by playing a video game. If he lost a level, A.W. would have to take off a piece of clothing or choose from a list of consequences, which included:
a bunch of different things; things like sit-ups with half dozen eggs, push-ups. Towards the bottom of the list the ones that stood out were a cake mix would be poured on me, that included dry and wet ingredients; I think there’s a brownie mix on there; and then the last one on the list said birthday suit.
A.W. removed some clothing and did exercises with eggs in his pockets. He stopped playing the game before he had to take off any more clothes because he became uncomfortable.
Twigg was charged by trial information with six counts of lascivious conduct with a minor. Five of the counts related to his conduct with D.W. The sixth concerned J.F. No charges were filed with respect to A.W. because he was not a minor at the time the acts were performed.
