Mother of woman murdered by boyfriend in his Manchester home calls for tougher sentences

• Elli's mum Gail explained to our reporter Anna Youssef why she wants a change in sentencing guidelines.

The mother of a woman murdered in her boyfriend's apartment in Manchester is calling for tougher sentences for domestic homicides.

Elli O'Brien, who was 22, was fatally stabbed by her partner Kevin Mannion, 45, on August 16, 2022 in his Manchester city centre apartment.

During the three-week trial, Liverpool Crown Court heard how Mannion killed Miss O'Brien after committing several assaults on her throughout their eight-month relationship.She had complained to police previously about being a victim of domestic abuse, but was too frightened to name Mannion as the perpetrator.

Mannion told the court he had no idea how his partner had been injured, and insisted he had found her lying in the hallway outside the flat before getting help.

The trial heard that after the killing, Mannion told interviewing officers that he and Miss O'Brien had argued after she asked if he was seeing other women, when he failed to respond to a number of texts.

In the weeks before he stabbed Miss O'Brien, Mannion had revealed that another woman he had been seeing had told him she was pregnant.

But a jury found him guilty of murder, wounding with intent, and coercive or controlling behaviour.

On 9 March, Mannion was jailed for life and ordered to serve a minimum term of just over 23 years and nine months.

Miss O'Brien's mother Gail Smith has joined families of other murdered women to call for an urgent review of the sentencing guidelines for men who kill their current or former partners at home.

In the UK, perpetrators can face a minimum of 15 years if they kill someone inside a home with a weapon that was already there.

If the weapon was taken to the scene or if the murder was committed outside a home, then the tariff changes to 10 years more, starting at 25 years.

Despite Mannion receiving a sentence that was on the higher side, Gail feels that the guidelines should change.

She said: "What we say is, it's a simple, it's easy and a non-party political issue. It is an issue that needs addressing and that sentencing start point needs to be raised, it needs to be shown that the value of a woman's life is the same as that of a man's life."

Gail says the current guidelines give off the message that killing someone in their own home is less important than someone who was killed outside of their home.

Gail said: "It simply gives out as a message that somewhat it is less serious to stab someone in the sanctuary of their own home, somewhere they feel safe, that is less serious.

"That is what is says, you are not as important as that life lost on the street.

"Any life lost, particularly in knife crime is horrendous. But to say that this is less serious because you are in own house and the knife is from your own knife block is simply a nonsense."

Gail and the other families created black and blue plaques to signify abuse and violence.

They are were designed this way to mimic the blue heritage plaques. They were placed onto buildings to emphasise that a person had been killed in a home and to say murder is murder, in a bid to change the law.

ITV News Granada have approached the Ministry of Justice but are yet to receive a response.

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