Moors murderer Myra Hindley yesterday lost her challenge to the decision by the British Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, that she should stay in prison for the rest of her life. However, the Lord Chief Justice left the door open for future applications for parole and raised the issue of whether judges or politicians should decide on whether a life-term prisoner should ever be released.
Lord Bingham also ruled that the former Home Secretary, Mr Michael Howard, had acted unlawfully in failing to make any allowance for the progress of a prisoner. The ruling was the latest in which Mr Howard had been deemed by the judiciary to have acted unlawfully.
The decision was welcomed by relatives of the children murdered by Hindley and Ian Brady but attacked by Lord Longford who has campaigned on her behalf. Hindley's legal team were granted leave to appeal.
In a 35-page judgment delivered at the High Court in London, the Lord Chief Justice ruled that the decisions of Mr Straw last month and of Mr Howard last February were lawful. They had both indicated that Hindley should not be granted parole, despite the fact that she had served more than an earlier tariff of 30 years.
The Lord Chief Justice however found that Mr Howard had acted unlawfully in December 1994 by "failing to make any allowance for the possibility that in exceptional circumstances, such as exceptional progress by a prisoner while in custody" a review and a reduction of a prisoner's term might be made. Mr Howard had indicated that those on whom a life tariff had been imposed would not be able to gain release by virtue of their progress in prison and lack of dangerousness to society.
Hindley had challenged the decisions of successive Home Secretaries in ruling that she should spend her life behind bars for the murders of Edward Evans and Lesley Ann Downey for which she was jailed for life in 1966. In 1987, she confessed to involvement in three other murders.
The Home Office welcomed the decision and said that although leave to appeal had been granted, the Lord Chief Justice had made it clear it was not as a result of any uncertainty but because of the "vast importance" of the matter.
Ms Winnie Johnson, the mother of one of Hindley's five victims, 12-year-old Keith Bennett, said outside the court: "I was worried in case she got away with it but if she ever tries to get out she will be dead." She criticised the fact that Hindley had been granted legal aid to pursue the case. Ms Ann West, Lesley Ann Downey's mother, who attended last week's hearing, was too ill to be in court.
Lord Longford, who attended the hearing, said: "It is, if you like, half-way back to capital punishment. It is quite iniquitous."
Hindley's co-defendant, Ian Brady, said in a letter to Guardian that people were "naive" if they thought that Hindley would give up her attempts to win her freedom now. He had also written to the Home Secretary saying that Hindley played an equal part with him in the killings.
The Lord Chief Justice, whose judgment was endorsed by Mr Justice Hooper and Mr Justice Astill, made it clear that the issues had ramifications far beyond the individual case.
Mr Paul Cavadino of the National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders, called for the decision-making process on life terms to be taken out of the hands of politicians.