Leeds prisoner jailed for life for murdering cellmate

A prisoner who used shattered glass from an aftershave bottle to murder his baby-killing cellmate has been jailed for life.

Convicted sex offender John Westland, 29, was told he must serve a minimum of 19 years for killing Liam Deane in Leeds Prison.

Deane was just a month into a life sentence himself, with a minimum of 10 years, having admitted the murder of his baby daughter.

Sentencing Westland on Thursday, Judge Rodney Jameson QC said: "You told the jury that you believed Liam Deane was a sex offender, but he was not.

"He had committed a very serious crime, but had admitted it from the first and was trying to come to terms with what he had done.

"It is an unfortunate consequence of life in prison that those who are themselves guilty of serious offences, as you were, will find another inmate to look down on.

"Given the nature of your own conviction, some might find that to be rank hypocrisy.''

Speaking of Deane's mother, the judge added: "She will suffer severely because her son never had the chance to atone for his crime, as there is every reason to believe that he was capable of doing.''

Westland was found guilty of murder following a week-long trial at Leeds Crown Court.

Prosecutors had claimed that the defendant told police "I murdered him because he's a sex offender'' a day after the body of Liam Deane was found in their shared cell.

Jurors were told how Deane, 22, was attacked using fragments of glass and asphyxiated by pressure applied to his head and face by Westland on the night of his death.

Westland was jailed at Oxford Crown Court in November 2008 for a sex attack.

Following the verdict on Wednesday, Detective Chief Inspector Ian Scott, of West Yorkshire Police, said: "Despite his conviction for that offence (the murder of his daughter), he and his family were entitled to expect he could serve his time in prison without having his life taken from him in sudden and violent circumstances by his cellmate John Westland."