Meat cleaver murderer who killed mum-of-three might be freed in 'behind closed doors' decision

A former soldier who killed a mum-of-three with a meat cleaver and dismembered her body could be freed after a private hearing by the Parole Board.

Stephen Wynne, then aged 26, attacked 27-year-old Chantel Taylor in the Wirral on March 13, 2004. However, her disappearance remained a mystery for more than a year. Detectives finally got a break when Wynne was arrested in July, 2005, after setting fire to the Shah Jalal mosque in Borough Road, Birkenhead, in "revenge" for the London bombings the previous year.

Wynne, who was chucked out of the army for using cannabis, became the prime suspect after a poem about a dead woman was found in his Birkenhead home. He later confessed to taking Ms Taylor back to his home. However Wynne said he struck her in the neck with the meat cleaver because he suspected she had stolen heroin.

Her body was never recovered.

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Wynne was jailed for life with a minimum term of 21 years in prison, later reduced to 18 years on appeal, reports the Echo.

Despite the savagery of his crimes, in February last year the Parole Board recommended that Wynne, who is held in HMP Berwyn, should be moved to open prison conditions. The Ministry of Justice refused to accept the recommendation in April 2022, leading to Wynne bringing a legal challenge over the department's position.

In a ruling on Thursday last week, a senior judge ruled in Wynne's favour, concluding that the Government had provided "no good reason" for rejecting the board's recommendation. Mrs Justice Steyn was told at a hearing in March that a Parole Board panel considering the offender's case examined a nearly 1,000-page dossier and 16 reports over a