Gary Allen: Why double killer could not have murdered Sheffield mum Michaela Hague

A man found guilty of the murders of two prostitutes could not have killed Sheffield sex worker Michaela Hague, whose death remains unsolved after nearly 20 years.
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Gary Allen was convicted yesterday of the murders of Alena Grlakova, aged 38, in Rotherham in 2018 and Samantha Class, 29, in Hull in 1997.

He is to be sentenced next week.

Allen, aged 47, had a hatred of sex workers and in prison he told probation workers that sex workers were ‘scum’ and ‘the lowest of the low’.

Michaela Hague was murdered in Sheffield in November 2001Michaela Hague was murdered in Sheffield in November 2001
Michaela Hague was murdered in Sheffield in November 2001
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He also admitted to having regular, violent fantasies involving sex workers, stating: “I like to frighten them, I like to cause pain, I like to make them cry, I like blood, I like to hurt them, I enjoy it, it makes me feel good.”

Detectives are looking for possible links with other sex worker crimes but Allen has been ruled out as a suspect for the murder of 25-year-old Michaela Hague, from Pitsmoor, who was stabbed to death in Sheffield on Bonfire Night 2001.

The mum-of-one was picked up by a man in a car on Bower Street, just off Corporation Street and found a short time later with 19 stab wounds.

Allen was behind bars at the time of the murder, having been sentenced for assaulting two sex workers in Plymouth.

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He was jailed for five and a half years in December 2000 and was released in 2003.

The murder of 19-year-old Dawn Shields in 1994 is the only other unsolved sex worker murder on South Yorkshire Police’s books.

She was killed after getting picked up in a car in Broomhall – Sheffield’s red light district at the time.

Her body was found in a shallow grave a week later on the slopes of Mam Tor, Castleton, in the Peak District.

She had head injuries and had been strangled.

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But DCI Mark Oughton, who led the investigation into the murders of Alena and Samantha, for which Allen is convicted, said ‘he is not forming part of our enquiries’ when asked about the unsolved Sheffield cases.

Anyone with information should call South Yorkshire Police on 101.