David Taylor

Mark Fellows and Lee Newell were already serving whole life orders when they killed Kyle Bevan, while David Taylor was handed a whole life order for the murder – meaning all three will never be released

One of the three inmates who killed a child murderer in his cell has been handed a whole life order – a sentence his two accomplices were already serving. Convicted murderers Mark Fellows, 45, Lee Newell, 57, and David Taylor, 64, fatally stabbed Kyle Bevan at high-security HMP Wakefield in West Yorkshire last November before neatly tucking him into bed and leaving him to bleed to death.

Bevan, 33, was serving a life sentence with a minimum term of 28 years for the murder of his partner's two-year-old daughter, Lola James, in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire, in 2020. Fellows and Newell were already under whole life orders when they murdered Bevan, meaning they will never be set free.

The judge, Mrs Justice McGowan, imposed "new and separate" whole life orders on both of them for Bevan's murder. Taylor received a whole life order for Bevan's death, in addition to the crimes he was awaiting trial for at the time.

These included the murder of missing 24 year old Alisha Apostoloff-Boyarin – a vulnerable woman he was romantically involved with but had grown weary of – and an attempt to kill a police officer in an interview room at another high-security prison.

Mrs Justice McGowan sentenced Taylor to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 20 years for Ms Apostoloff-Boyarin's murder and gave him a 30-year sentence for the attempted murder of the officer.

She then imposed a whole life order for Bevan's murder, as it constituted a second offence of murder. After expressing gratitude to the trial jurors who had attended the sentencing hearing, the judge remarked: "I've never had to sentence someone for a third murder, and in two of these defendants' cases that's what just happened."

Fellows was the sole defendant among the trio to appear in court for the hearing, while Newell and Taylor participated via video-link from prison.

The court was told Newell was initially imprisoned for murder in 1989 after throttling his female neighbour, who was in her 50s at the time, following her refusal to provide him with money.

He subsequently received a whole life order in 2013 after throttling a prisoner who had killed a child and abandoning him in his bed, with "a chilling similarity to... the circumstances of Kyle Bevan's death".

Fellows, an assassin dubbed "the Wakefield Dexter", had carried out two underworld killings - including Salford's Mr Big, Paul Massey - and was handed a whole life term in 2019.

He had officially requested a transfer from Wakefield shortly before Bevan's killing due to his displeasure with the conditions there.

Taylor had been recently moved to Wakefield. The court was informed Taylor had bragged about his capability to craft improvised weapons "out of all sorts", and following Bevan's death some were discovered in a chilli sauce bottle within his cell, though they could not be linked to the fatal assault.

When Taylor appeared via video-link for proceedings before the jury was sworn in, he was accompanied into a room at Full Sutton prison, near York, by several officers wearing full riot equipment. Before he was permitted to sit and listen to lawyers discuss concerns about the threat he posed, two sets of handcuffs had to be removed from him.

The judge was informed that prison authorities had been worried that Taylor had somehow managed to hide a weapon in his body for several weeks, but this could not be located.

The court was also told that if they were to testify in the witness box, prison authorities wanted all three defendants to be handcuffed. However, in the end, none of them took the stand.

The trial heard that there was "a lot of tension in the prison at the time" and there had been two other serious attacks in the weeks leading up to Bevan's death – one in which paedophile Lostprophets singer Ian Watkins was stabbed to death and one in which David Minto, who murdered 16 year old Sasha Marsden in Blackpool in 2013, was seriously injured.

Jurors were informed that unlike other prisons, vulnerable inmates were not separated from the general population at Wakefield.

The regime at the time meant "main prisoners" such as Fellows, Newell and Taylor "had to mix with, in a distorted moral hierarchy, other criminals that were beneath them" such as child killers, according to prosecutors.

The court was told that the three defendants harboured animosity towards individuals who had committed crimes against children, and Fellows and Newell had expressed a wish to be transferred away from Wakefield.

Bevan "kept himself to himself" and would mainly stay in his cell, often requesting to be locked inside, jurors were informed.

On the day of his demise, he was captured on CCTV walking to his cell, trailed by the three accused who were mere seconds behind.

Taylor could be seen retrieving something from his waistband as he entered.

The court was told it is not known "who did what" within the cells, but that Bevan was likely restrained by his arms while being stabbed 25 times with at least two weapons.

The court heard the three defendants exited the cell less than five minutes later "as if nothing had happened".

They could be seen exchanging handshakes and seemingly congratulating each other.

Newell had a wound on his hand while Fellows could be seen hoisting up his tracksuit bottoms after noticing they were blood-stained, and later discarding them.

Jurors were informed that one weapon, crafted from a folded piece of metal from the back of a television, was tossed from Bevan's cell and discovered on the ground outside. It bore Bevan's blood.

The weapon which inflicted the fatal injuries has never been recovered.

The trial heard that, as Taylor was being relocated out of Wakefield, he was overheard shouting in Newell's direction: "Nice working with you and the Iceman" – a moniker for Fellows.