Ripper in 'mental disorder' plea against indefinite prison term

The submission was made by Edward Fitzgerald QC, representing Sutcliffe for his challenge against a High Court judge's ruling that he must serve a "whole life" tariff.

Mr Fitzgerald told three judges in London: "We accept that the applicant was convicted of the brutal murder of 13 women and the attempted murder of seven others and, on the face of it, we accept that the number and the nature of the murders is such that would call for a whole life tariff.

"The submission in this case is that the disorder suffered, and still suffered by the applicant, is a sufficient mitigating circumstance to justify a long, finite term of years instead of a whole life tariff."

He told the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, Mr Justice Calvert-Smith and Mr Justice Griffith Williams: "Can I just stress that, of course, the tariff only means the minimum term he must serve before he can apply for parole and it does not have any implications as to release.

"It just means that he would have the opportunity to put his case to the Parole Board."

Sutcliffe, now known as Peter Coonan, is challenging a ruling by Mr Justice Mitting on July 16.

The former lorry driver, from Bradford, West Yorkshire, was convicted at the Old Bailey in 1981.

Sutcliffe, now 64, received 20 life terms for the murder of 13 women and the attempted murder of others in Yorkshire and Greater Manchester.

He is being held in Broadmoor top security psychiatric hospital after being transferred from prison in 1984 suffering from paranoid schizophrenia.

It was on July 5, 1975, just 11 months after his marriage, that he took a hammer and carried out his first attack on a woman.

Sutcliffe is said to have believed he was on a "mission from God" to kill prostitutes –although not all of his victims were sex workers – and was dubbed the Yorkshire Ripper because he mutilated their bodies using a hammer, a sharpened screwdriver and a knife.

Mr Justice Mitting, when setting a whole life tariff, said the primary submission made on behalf of Sutcliffe was that the degree of his responsibility "was lowered by mental disorder or mental disability".

The diagnosis of psychiatrists who considered his mental condition was that he was "suffering from encapsulated paranoid schizophrenia when he committed the crimes and that his responsibility for the 13 killings was, in consequence, substantially diminished".

But the judge said: "These propositions were, however, unquestionably rejected by the jury."

He ruled: "It is not, in my opinion, open to a judge, setting a minimum term, to go behind the verdict of the jury by concluding that, although the defendant's responsibility was not proved to have been substantially diminished, he should be given the benefit of the doubt for the purpose of setting the minimum term, by concluding that it might have been."

At the start of proceedings today, Mr Fitzgerald said the starting point for his submission that a finite term could be imposed was that this was the view taken in 1997 by former Lord Chief Justice Lord Bingham when he recommended a tariff period of 35 years.

He added: "That was on the basis that his mental state was disturbed at the time."

Mr Fitzgerald submitted that, in the sentencing exercise, "the proper approach is that any mitigating factor that cannot be reasonably excluded should at least be taken into account".

The QC said that, in the last 29 years, "a massive amount" of developments had taken place, "all of which, in our submission, confirm that he was suffering from mental disorder". The judges reserved their decision to a later date.