Woman beaten to death by ex after he evaded custody and hounded her with phone calls

A woman was brutally attacked in her own home after her abusive ex-partner evaded custody and breached his restraining order. Angela Craddock, from Warrington, died in April 2018 after being beaten by William Smart, despite the fact he was on recall for breaching his licence conditions.

At a recent inquest hearing, Cheshire's senior coroner Jacqueline Devonish heard how Smart fatally assaulted 40-year-old Ms Craddock after being released from prison, where he was detained for assaulting his victim and carrying a knife. Despite being given a restraining order for a year, Smart continued to hound his ex, Cheshire Live reports, and called her a total of 160 times in the 39 days after his conviction.

Ms Devonish, who has released a report to prevent future deaths, raised concerns that the correct staff were not made aware of Smart's restraining order. In the document, addressed to HMP Altcourse, Ministry of Justice and HM Prison and Probation Service, the coroner highlighted areas that could be addressed to prevent similar deaths taking place.

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She said: "Details of the Restraining Order were sent to HMP Altcourse and on receipt a paper copy of the conditions were placed in an envelope to be delivered to the Public Protection Department. This was never received so the relevant staff were not aware of the Restraining Order.

"Consequently, upon release on licence the community rehabilitation service were unaware of the breaches of the Restraining Order and were unable to include this information in the Offender Assessment System's risk assessment or the prison recall report and review, ultimately sent on to the police for the enforcement of the recall