Peter Sullivan: 'I am not angry or bitter' as murder conviction quashed after 38 years in prison

Peter Sullivan appeared via video link from HMP Wakefield on Tuesday as three senior judges overturned his conviction for the 1986 killing of 21-year-old barmaid Diane Sindall in Bebington, Merseyside. As the judgment was delivered, Sullivan bowed his head, visibly emotional. A relative in court cried and exclaimed: “We’ve done it.”

The decision ends his nearly four decades in prison and is believed to be one of the UK’s longest-serving miscarriages of justice.

Sullivan was arrested in 1986 and convicted the following year, aged 30. Despite being handed a minimum term of 16 years, he spent 38 years behind bars, after repeated efforts to appeal his case failed, until new DNA evidence showed that he could not have been the killer.

Lord Justice Holroyde, sitting with Mr Justice Goss and Mr Justice Bryan, said: “In the light of that evidence, it is impossible to regard the appellant’s conviction as safe. We have no doubt that it is both necessary and expedient in the interests of justice to quash the conviction.”

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) did not oppose the appeal. Its barristers told the court there was “no credible basis on which the appeal can be opposed” and that the DNA evidence was “sufficient fundamentally to cast doubt on the safety of the conviction.”

Sullivan first applied to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) in 2008, but the body declined to refer his case. His 2019 appeal was also rejected. However, in 2021, the CCRC reopened the case and discovered that DNA samples from the scene did not match Sullivan, prompting the latest appeal.

During Tuesday’s hearing, Sullivan’s lawyers told the court the evidence showed that Ms Sindall’s killer “was not the defendant”.

The court also acknowledged the ongoing impact of the crime on the victim’s family. “The brutal attack which ended Miss Sindall’s young life also blighted the lives of her fiancée, her family and all those who loved her,” said Lord Justice Holroyde. “We offer our condolences to the bereaved.”

Following the ruling, Merseyside Police confirmed that 260 men have been eliminated from the investigation since the inquiry was reopened in 2023. They also stated that none of Diane Sindall’s loved ones are implicated.

Detective Chief Superintendent Karen Jaundrill said: “Our thoughts remain with the family and friends of Diane Sindall who continue to mourn her loss and will have to endure the implications of this new development so many years after her murder.

We are committed to doing everything within our power to find whom the DNA, which was left at the scene, belongs to.”

She added that the DNA does not match anyone in the national DNA database, but that police are now working with the National Crime Agency to identify the profile. “Extensive and painstaking inquiries are under way,” she said.

The court also heard that shortly after the murder, an unidentified man contacted police claiming to have stolen and burned Diane’s clothes. He later retracted his story, which was dismissed at the time due to bite mark evidence, a type of forensic evidence that has since been discredited.

Peter Sullivan’s statement in full:

Peter Sullivan’s statement, read outside court on his behalf by his lawyer Sarah Myatt: “I lost my liberty four decades ago over a crime I did not commit. “We now know how very different the times we live in are from scientific advances, legal practice and methods of investigation and questioning by the police.

“What happened to me was very wrong, but it does not detract or minimise that all of this happened off the back of a heinous and most terrible loss of life. I did not commit murder or unlawfully take the life of any person throughout the span of my own.

“As God is my witness, it is said the truth shall take you free. It is unfortunate that it does not give a timescale as we advance towards resolving the wrongs done to me, I am not angry, I am not bitter.

“I am simply anxious to return to my loved ones and family as I’ve got to make the most of what is left of the existence I am granted in this world. I am aware of how cruel time can be to a person stripped of their youth and mobility sight and hearing.

“I have had to silently endure this and watch it stripped from me in the worst environment imaginable, I will not comment on the horrors done to me over that time, there are too many. With this I humbly request that you allow me my privacy while I begin repairing what I made from the driftwood that is my life.

“I am so grateful to Sarah Myatt, Jim Littlehales, Switalskis solicitors who have been committed to my case for 20 years, they have stood by me through the good times and the bad while I fought to prove my innocence.

“I would also like to thank Jason Kitter, my KC and Emily Cairns and her team from the CCRC. Without the combined efforts of Sarah, Jim, Jason and Emily, this outcome would not have been possible.

“I will be eternally grateful to each and every one of them. Thank you also to the miscarriage of justice support services who have been very helpful in helping me prepare for today. I would also like to say thank you to my loved ones and family members who have stood by me and who have continued to support me through this.

“Finally, I would like to say how far I am to the family of Diane Sindall, who have now got to come to terms with the death of their daughter being down to someone else, and I long to see the right thing done for this horrible crime so that they will find peace.”