South Yorkshire killers who will never be released from prison, including Arthur Hutchinson and Ian Birley

The rogue cop strangled 33-year-old marketing executive Sarah Everard after kidnapping her as she walked home in London.

Couzens, 48, tricked Sarah into believing he was arresting her for breaking lockdown rules and then went on to rape and kill her.

Lord Justice Fulford described the circumstances of the murder as ‘grotesque’ and said the seriousness of the case was so ‘exceptionally high’ that it warranted a whole life order.

Murder carries a mandatory life sentence and judges set a minimum number of years offenders must serve before they can be considered for parole.

But in extreme cases, whole life orders can be imposed, meaning that prisoners will never be released.

At the end of June there were 60 criminals serving whole life orders.

Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe, who was arrested in Sheffield, died in November 2021 at the age of 74 while serving a whole life order.

His arrest in Broomhall in January 1981 ended a five-year reign of terror.

His killing spree triggered one of the largest police manhunt’s in history.

The serial killer murdered 13 women and attempted to kill another seven.

He was finally captured when two police officers on patrol in Sheffield spotted a car with false number plates.

Sutcliffe was found in the vehicle with a prostitute and was taken in for questioning at Hammerton Road police station, Hillsborough, before being transferred to Dewsbury Police Station to be questioned about the Yorkshire Ripper case as he matched many of the killer’s known physical characteristics.

The following day, one of the officers returned to the scene of the arrest and discovered a knife, hammer and rope that Sutcliffe had discarded in bushes when he told officers he was ‘bursting for a pee’.

A second knife was found hidden in a toilet cistern at Hammerton Road cop shop.

Murderer Arthur Hutchinson, who killed three members of a Sheffield family, challenged a whole life order he was sentenced to but lost his appeal and will also spend the rest of his life locked up.

He broke into a home in Dore in October 1983 and fatally stabbed husband and wife Basil and Avril Laitner and their son Richard.

Just hours earlier the family had hosted a wedding celebration.

The judge in his original trial ruled that he should serve a minimum of 18 years behind bars but then-home secretary Leon Brittan later imposed a whole life order.

In 1989, killer Anthony Arkwright was sentenced to a whole life tariff for a 56-hour killing spree in which he disembowelled three victims in Wath-upon-Dearne, Rotherham.

He was sacked from his job in Mexborough then went home and stabbed his grandfather and two of his neighbours.

In February 2018, Ian Birley was sentenced to a whole life term for murdering 65-year-old John Gogarty, at his Wombwell home, Barnsley.

Birley struck 18 months after he had been released from prison for another murder.

The killer was out on licence after serving his sentence for a 1995 murder, when he attacked Mr Gogarty – stabbing him 69 times.

He and an accomplice attacked their victim during a robbery to pay a drugs debt.