A woman whose mum was raped and murdered in Birmingham is backing calls for a new law to ensure the killer has to stay in jail until he dies - unless he reveals what he did with the body.
Michelle Gunshon, 38, had been working at the Clothes Show Live event at the National Exhibition Centre when she went missing in December 2004.
Her killer was Martin Stafford, who had been working as a glass collector at the Digbeth pub where she was staying.
But daughter Tracy Richardson still doesn’t know where her mother was buried.
She even wrote to Stafford in jail, asking him: “What did you do with my mum?”
Ms Richardson was in the House of Commons to support calls for a change in the law to prevent killers being eligible for parole in cases where they refuse to help the authorities locate or recover the remains of the victim.
It would mean that someone who received a life sentence would actually have to stay in prison for the rest of their life, unless they revealed what they did with the body.
The legislation would also make it a specific offence to withhold such information.
It was proposed by Merseyside Labour MP Conor McGinn, who told MPs: “For a parent to suffer the anguish of losing a child is beyond words, but the horror of having such a loved one murdered is surely too awful even to contemplate, so it is harder still, if even possible, to imagine the pain of being denied the chance to hold a proper funeral and lay that loved one to rest.”
He highlighted a number of cases, including that of Michelle Gunshon, where killers had refused to provide information.
And he said a petition calling for new laws had already been signed by 340,000 people.
The MP said: “In essence, the proposals are simple: if a convicted killer refuses to give information to reveal the location of a victim’s body, they should not be considered eligible for parole and they should stay in prison.
“The proposals would effectively mean a whole-life tariff for murderers who refuse to disclose the location of their victims and enable their remains to be recovered to give families a chance to pay their last respects.”
And he said: “The families of victims quite rightly expect the law to act in their favour, instead of seeing the justice system rewarding with parole killers who decide to remain silent.”
Mr McGinn’s proposed legislation is unlikely to become law immediately but presenting it to the Commons and leading a debate is a means of highlighting the issue with Government ministers and putting pressure on them to introduce their own legislation.
Stafford, from Dublin, was found guilty of Michelle Gunshon’s murder as well as false imprisonment, rape and preventing the burial of a body, after a Birmingham Crown Court trial in 2012.
He fled to Ireland after murdering Ms Gunshon and was extradited to stand trial in the UK.
