Yorkshire Ripper launches bid for prison release

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Peter Sutcliffe, convicted in 1981 of murder of 13 women, asks high court to set tariff which could lead to parole

Matthew Taylor
guardian.co.uk, Monday 1 March 2010 14.10 GMT
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The serial killer Peter Sutcliffe is seeking a high court ruling to determine how much longer he must serve in jail. Sutcliffe, known as the Yorkshire Ripper, got 20 life terms in 1981 for murdering 13 women and attacking seven others.

The 63-year-old is now asking the court to grant him a finite sentence.

Sutcliffe, who is held in Broadmoor high security psychiatric hospital, will have to persuade the mental health review tribunal that he no longer poises a risk before he can be eligible to apply for parole.

He first lodged his request in 2008 and reporting restrictions on the case ensured he was only referred to as P. However Mr Justice Mitting, sitting in the high court in London, ruled that Sutcliffe, now known as Peter Coonan, could be identified. "It is now common ground this is part of the criminal process and must therefore proceed in the defendant's own name. The press are at liberty to report the fact that these proceedings concern Peter Sutcliffe/Peter Coonan."

A judge recommended, at the time of the 1981 trial, that Sutcliffe serve a minimum of 30 years behind bars, which expires next year. However Sutcliffe's name was not on a Home Office list, published in 2006, of 35 murderers serving "whole life" sentences, and he was given no formal minimum sentence. Today's preliminary hearing at the high court in London set out what form the tariff-setting hearing should take, and what evidence should be admitted.

Mitting was told there was new expert evidence on Sutcliffe's state of mind, which could help his case for release on licence. However the judge refused an application on Sutcliffe's behalf for fresh psychiatric evidence to be admitted as part of the tariff-setting exercise, although, he said, it would be considered in relation to his conduct post-sentence.

When Sutcliffe is reviewed later this year, the gravity of his crimes, whether or not he has made "exceptional" progress in custody, the state of his mental health and any representations from him, his victims or their families, will be taken into account.

The judge will have the power to impose a definite number of years that Sutcliffe must serve, and could rule that he spends the rest of his life in jail. Sutcliffe was convicted at the Old Bailey in London for the murder of 13 women, and on seven counts of attempted murder, in Yorkshire, Greater Manchester and Lancashire. The former lorry driver said he was on a "mission from God" to kill prostitutes – although not all of his victims were sex workers – and was dubbed the Yorkshire Ripper because he mutilated their bodies using a hammer, a sharpened screw driver and a knife. In 1984 he was transferred to Broadmoor from prison.

His life sentence means that, whatever the outcome of the tariff decision, he will only be freed if the authorities consider he no longer poses a serious danger to the public.