Murder of Garry Newlove

Garry Newlove (5 November 1959 – 12 August 2007) was an English man beaten to death in August 2007 in the UK.His murder caused anger in the UK over the two offenders who had been drinking underage. Former Chief Constable Peter Fahy called for the legal age of buying alcohol to increase to the age of 21 as a result of the Garry Newlove murder. His widow Helen Newlove condemned the Government for failing to get to grips with youth disorder afterwards.

Garry Newlove was born in Salford, Lancashire, on 5 November 1959, the youngest of three children born to Thomas Edward Newlove (1913–1979) and his wife Ellen (1919–2002). He was married to Helen Marston from 1986 until his death, and had three teenage daughters. By 2007, he was working as a sales manager for a plastics company.

Newlove was attacked outside his house in Station Road North in the Padgate district of Warrington, Cheshire, on the evening of 10 August 2007, having gone outside to confront a gang of youths he suspected of vandalising his wife's car. He died in hospital two days later.

The murder was the culmination of numerous incidents of anti-social behaviour by youth gangs in and around the Padgate area, which had lasted for several years.

Three teenagers were quickly arrested and charged with his murder on 14 August 2007 and remanded in custody. Four other suspects were also arrested and later released without charge. A fourth teenager was charged and remanded the next day and the fifth and final suspect was charged and remanded on 13 September.

Adam Swellings, 19 and from Crewe, went on trial at Chester Crown Court charged with the murder on 14 November 2007, along with two 17-year-olds, a 16-year-old and a 15-year-old who could not be named for legal reasons.

On 16 January 2008, Adam Swellings was convicted of Mr Newlove's murder, along with 17-year-old Stephen Sorton and 16-year-old Jordan Cunliffe. The two other teenagers were cleared of any involvement in the killing and walked free from court. The three convicted murderers were remanded in custody until being sentenced to life imprisonment on 11 February 2008. The trial judge recommended that Swellings, Sorton and Cunliffe should serve minimum terms of 17, 15 and 12 years respectively - sentences which were widely described as lenient by the victim's family and friends, as well as the tabloid media - as these sentences meant that the youngest of the three killers could be out of prison by the age of 28, and the oldest was likely to be paroled in his mid thirties.

...
Wikipedia