A rapist who abducted and murdered a Co Tyrone pensioner on her way home from Mass was today told he would spend the rest of his life behind bars.
Farm labourer Trevor Hamilton (23) bludgeoned retired librarian Attracta Harron (65) and then buried her naked body at a riverbank near his home in Sion Mills, Co Tyrone, in December 2003.
Trevor Hamilton who abducted and murdered Attracta Harron in December 2003
Sentencing him at Dungannon Crown Court, Mr Justice Richard McLaughlin told him that the punishment had to be the toughest possible because of the sinister similarities with an earlier brutal sex attack on a woman he lured into his car.
"What you did to Mrs Harron, a good and loving woman, was at once nauseating and horrifying, it was the stuff of nightmares and the epitome of the loss of innocence in our community," Mr Justice McLaughlin said.
"What that poor woman experienced as you prepared to execute her, whatever weapon you used to accomplish it, was so appalling that it demands retribution of the most severe kind.
"You will in consequence spend the rest of your life in prison," the judge said.
Hamilton, shaven headed and dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, showed no emotion in the dock as the sentence was handed down. He has shown a complete lack of remorse throughout his trial.
The body of Mrs Harron, a mother-of-five, was so badly decomposed when it was found naked and wrapped in an animal feed sack, that detectives could not confirm if she had been sexually assaulted.
But Mr Justice McLaughlin had no doubt that Hamilton, given his history, had also been driven by his sexual lust.
He had been released from prison just four-months earlier and was on parole after raping a woman in a caravan at his home.
Although during the seven-week trial - at which jurors were told of Hamilton's evil past — experts said either an axe or hatchet may have been used to kill Mrs Harron, the judge said today that even a brick, metal bar, lump hammer or boot heel could have been used by Hamilton to batter his victim.
"The manner of her death was callous and brutal in the extreme.
"By whatever mechanism, the fatal injuries were inflicted there can be no dispute that very significant force was used and it was applied pitilessly with killing cruelty and without regard for the suffering of a helpless woman unable to escape, fight back or otherwise defend herself."