Katie Piper’s acid attacker Stefan Sylvestre may have left UK in August as police launch ‘urgent’ manhunt

Police are urgently hunting the man who threw acid over television presenter Katie Piper after he was recalled to jail for breaching his licence conditions.

Officers believe Stefan Sylvestre, from Shepherd’s Bush, west London, may have left the country 10 weeks ago and have warned the public he should not be approached.

Mr Sylvestre, 34, was given a life sentence in 2009 for the attack and was told he must serve a minimum of six years before he would be eligible for parole. He was released in 2018 when he was aged 30.

Police say he was recalled to jail for breaching his licence conditions and “inquiries undertaken so far indicate” he left the UK on 2 August.

Scotland Yard, who were notified on 23 September that Sylvestre had been recalled, say he should not be approached. His last known address was in north London.

Officers from the Metropolitan Police’s specialist crime command are trying to locate and arrest him and are appealing to anyone who has information on his whereabouts to get in touch.

A Probation Service spokeswoman said on Sunday (9 October): “We are urgently working with the police to bring the offender back to prison where he’ll face longer behind bars.”

Ms Piper, 38, suffered life-changing injuries to her face and neck in the pre-planned attack that left her permanently scarred.

She was left fighting for her life after her obsessive ex-boyfriend Daniel Lynch arranged for Mr Sylvestre to throw the corrosive liquid in March 2008. The attack was caught on CCTV, and the two men were later arrested.

Mr Lynch was jailed for life with a minimum of 16 years for sexually assaulting Ms Piper and telling Mr Sylvestre to throw acid over her. He will remain behind bars until at least 2025.

The pair had dated briefly before steroid-fuelled martial arts fan Mr Lynch, who had a previous conviction for pouring boiling water over a man, became obsessively jealous.

In court, both Mr Lynch and Mr Sylvestre were told by Judge Nicholas Browne QC they were “the face of pure evil”.

Mr Sylvestre’s parole application for release was approved in 2018 and he was released in October of that year.

In 2009, Ms Piper gave up her right to anonymity in order to increase awareness about burn victims. Later in the same year, she established a charity, the Katie Piper Foundation, aimed at raising awareness of the plight of victims of burns and other disfigurement injuries.

She was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours list in recognition of her services to charity and burns survivors.

In 2015 she married carpenter Richard Sutton in 2015, and the pair have two daughters; Belle Elizabeth, born March 2014, and Penelope Diane, born December 2017.