Wayne Couzens and killers of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes to have prison sentences reviewed

4 May 2022, 06:05 | Updated: 4 May 2022, 06:12

The murderer of Sarah Everard, Wayne Couzens, is among five killers who are set to have their prison sentences reviewed by the Court of Appeal.

The disgraced former Met Police officer, who kidnapped, raped and murdered the 33-year-old marketing executive in south London, will have his whole-life sentence reviewed by five senior judges today.

The special court of five judges will hear challenges or appeals to the prison sentences of five killers, including Wayne Couzens and the killers of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, Emma Tustin and Thomas Hughes.

Jordan Monaghan, who murdered two of his children and his new partner, and double murderer Ian Stewart will also have their sentences reviewed.

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Couzens, who was a serving Met Police officer when he murdered Ms Everard in March 2021, was handed a whole-life term because the circumstances of the case were "devastating, tragic and wholly brutal".

It was the first time a whole-life order had been imposed for a single murder of an adult not committed in the course of a terror attack.

Couzens, 49, will attempt to appeal his whole-life order.

Emma Tustin and Thomas Hughes, who killed six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, are also expected to have their sentences reviewed.

Tustin, Arthur's killer stepmother, was jailed for life in December last year, with a minimum term of 29 years, after being found guilty of the six-year-old's murder.

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Arthur, whose body was covered in 130 bruises, suffered an unsurvivable brain injury while in Tustin's care.

His father, Thomas Hughes, 29, was sentenced to 21 years for manslaughter and is due to appeal his sentence.

Attorney General Suella Braverman will also challenge both sentences under the unduly lenient sentence scheme.

Double murderer Ian Stewart, 61, who was convicted of murdering his first wife six years before he went on to murder his fiancée, is also due to appeal against his whole-life order.

Stewart killed 51-year-old children's book author Helen Bailey in 2016, and dumped her body in the cesspit of the £1.5 million home they shared in Hertfordshire.

A trial previously heard it was most likely she was suffocated while sedated by drugs, and Stewart was found guilty of her murder in 2017.

After this conviction, police investigated the 2010 death of Stewart's first wife, Diane Stewart, 47.

The cause of her death was recorded at the time as sudden unexplained death in epilepsy, but in February Stewart was found guilty of her murder.

Stewart will attempt to appeal his whole-life order.

The minimum 40-year term handed to Jordan Monaghan after he murdered two of his children and his new partner will also be reviewed by judges.

In December 2021 Monaghan was jailed after smothering his 24-day-old daughter Ruby as she slept in a Moses basket on New Year's Day 2013.

Eight months later he smothered his 21-month-old son Logan, and six years after that he murdered his new partner, Evie Adams, with a drugs overdose.

The hearing before the Lord Chief Justice Lord Burnett, Dame Victoria Sharp, Lord Justice Holroyde, Mr Justice Sweeney and Mr Justice Johnson is due to start on Wednesday at 10.30am.

The five judges are expected to give their decisions at a later date.