Alun Kyte, a lorry driver from Stafford, was convicted in March 2000 of murdering two women who worked as sex workers in the English Midlands. Samo Paull, 20, was killed in 1993, and Tracey Turner, 30, in 1994. He met each woman where she worked, one in Birmingham and one at a motorway service station, and each was later found strangled beside a road in Leicestershire, tens of miles away. The press called him the "Midlands Ripper."
He was not arrested for the murders until 1998. By then he was in custody over a rape committed in Weston-super-Mare in 1997, and the DNA sample taken in that case matched material from Tracey Turner's body. A jury at Nottingham Crown Court took three and a half hours to find him guilty of both killings. He was given life with a minimum term of 25 years. Long after his conviction he admitted killing Tracey Turner, while still denying that he killed Samo Paull.
In 2023 another jury at the same court convicted him of a long campaign of sexual and physical abuse against a young boy in Staffordshire, which began in the late 1980s, years before the murders. He received a third life sentence. Detectives who worked on the murder inquiry have said they believe there were more victims, but he has never been charged with any other killing.
Sources that could be checked for this account say little about Kyte's early life. Reports of all three of his trials describe him as being from Stafford, in Staffordshire. He worked as a lorry driver, and the Coventry Telegraph, in a later review of the case, noted that the job gave him cover and freedom to move around the region. He had a home in Staffordshire in the late 1980s, which is where, a jury later found, he abused a young boy.
These crimes came to light only many years later, but they began first. According to the evidence heard at Nottingham Crown Court in 2023, Kyte lured a primary-school-age boy to his Staffordshire home with the promise of toys. The boy was nine when it began. Staffordshire Police dated the offenses to between 1989 and 1994. Over about five years Kyte subjected him to repeated violent and sexual abuse, and threatened the boy's family to keep him silent.
The boy, now a man, gave evidence at the trial. The prosecutor, Ben Lawrence, said the abuse followed a pattern of rising violence and threats, which explained why the boy felt he could not tell anyone. He is not named, and he is not described further here.
Samo Paull was 20 years old, a single mother from Rowley Regis, in the Black Country west of Birmingham. She worked as a sex worker, and she met Kyte in Balsall Heath, an area of Birmingham. In December 1993 she was found strangled in a roadside ditch in Leicestershire, near the M1, almost 40 miles from where she had met him.
Kyte was convicted of her murder in 2000. He has never admitted it. When he asked the High Court to reduce his sentence in 2013, the judge recorded that he still denied any involvement in her death, and reports of his 2023 trial said the same.
Tracey Turner was 30 years old and worked as a sex worker at motorway service stations in the region. She met Kyte at a service station on the M6. In March 1994 she was found strangled on a grass verge near the village of Bitteswell, close to Lutterworth in Leicestershire. That was about six miles from the place where Samo Paull had been found, and about 50 miles from the service station where Tracey Turner had met her killer.
Kyte denied this murder too at his trial. Years later he admitted it. ITV News reported in 2023 that he had admitted strangling her after, in his words, she "pestered" him to finish a meal. By 2013 he had accepted responsibility for her death before a High Court judge.
The two deaths, a few miles from each other, became one of the largest murder inquiries in Leicestershire, according to ITV News. Mick Creedon, a detective superintendent at the time, led the original investigation; he later became Chief Constable of Derbyshire Police.
The case stayed unsolved for years. The break came from a separate crime. In 1997 Kyte raped a woman at knifepoint in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset; she escaped from him into the street. He was arrested there, and his DNA was taken. It matched samples recovered from Tracey Turner's body. He was arrested for the murders in 1998.
In January 1999 he was convicted of the Weston-super-Mare rape and sentenced to seven years. The woman he attacked survived and is not named. ITV News reported that he had been charged with that rape before he was charged with the murders.
Kyte stood trial for both murders at Nottingham Crown Court and denied them. The jury took three and a half hours to convict him. On March 14, 2000, he was sentenced to life imprisonment for each murder, with a minimum term of 25 years to be served before he could be considered for parole.
At the time of his conviction, David Colman, an assistant chief constable of Leicestershire Police, said he did not believe "we have uncovered the full extent of his criminality," the Coventry Telegraph later recalled. Police went on to look at possible links to dozens of other deaths and disappearances of women in the 1980s and 1990s. None led to a charge.
In 2013 Kyte asked the High Court in London to cut his minimum term from 25 years to 20, arguing that 25 was too long. His lawyers told the court he had done important rehabilitative work in prison and had made "impressive progress." Mr Justice Cranston refused. He noted that Kyte had accepted responsibility for Tracey Turner's murder but denied any part in Samo Paull's, and he found that Kyte had not made the progress needed to affect his sentence. The ruling was reported on August 8, 2013.
In 2012 Kyte was interviewed by police about the abuse of the boy. In that interview, the Press Association later reported, he described himself as a "sexual predator."
The case came to trial at Nottingham Crown Court in early 2023 before Judge Nirmal Shant KC. A reporting restriction kept his name and history out of the news during the trial, and jurors were told only some details of his past. He denied everything, calling the allegations "made-up" and saying the events "never happened." Under cross-examination he accepted that he was capable of extreme violence, but denied that he had harmed the boy.
On February 13, 2023, after about four hours of deliberation, the jury unanimously found him guilty of all 11 counts: four of indecency with a child, three of attempting to choke, two of indecent assault on a male and two of buggery. He was 58.
Sentencing was set for February 24 but took place on May 11, 2023. Kyte appeared by video link from prison and said nothing. Ben Lawrence read the victim's statement, which described depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, said that his medication had affected his ability to have children, and said he had lived "in constant fear" of further abuse and had never been able to be open with anyone.
Judge Shant called it "a brutal attack on a young boy" and "a campaign of attacks on a young, defenceless boy." She said Kyte had picked the boy up by the throat, taunted him as he struggled to breathe because of his asthma, and threatened to kill him and his family if he told anyone. "The trauma still lives with him," she said. She described the violence as extreme. She passed a life sentence with a minimum term of 10 years and 8 months, his third life sentence.
Temporary Detective Sergeant Katie Page of Staffordshire Police, who investigated the case, said the victim had shown great strength and determination in reporting what had happened to him so many years before. The force said Kyte intended to appeal.
Before the 2023 case, the Press Association reported, Kyte had been due to become eligible for parole in 2025. As of May 2023 he was in prison serving three life sentences. ITV News and the Press Association reported that he was held at HMP Rye Hill, near Rugby in Warwickshire; Staffordshire Police gave his address as HMP Onley. No later court ruling, parole decision or news report about him was found in searches made in October 2026, and no published Court of Appeal judgment on the 2023 conviction was found.
Police have long suspected that Kyte killed other women. Mick Creedon, speaking after the 2023 verdict, said the result was "not surprising" and that he was "sure there's more victims out there." His team, he said, had always known Kyte was dangerous. He described him as controlling, manipulative, cunning and very arrogant, and as one of the most evil people he had met in a long career.
These remain suspicions. Kyte has never been charged with any killing other than the murders of Samo Paull and Tracey Turner, and no other death has been attributed to him by a court. Press reports in 2022 and 2023 raised the names of several other women, killed or missing in the 1990s, as possible victims; those cases are not his crimes in any legal sense and are not listed here.
Proven by jury verdicts, and final: the murders of Samo Paull and Tracey Turner (2000); the 1997 rape in Weston-super-Mare (1999); the 11 offenses against a boy between 1989 and 1994 (2023). Kyte said in 2023 that he would appeal the last of these; no ruling on such an appeal was found.
Admitted after conviction: the killing of Tracey Turner. Still denied: the killing of Samo Paull.
Not charged: any other killing. Detectives' belief that there were more victims is an opinion, not a finding.
Details that vary between sources: the spelling of Tracey Turner's first name ("Tracey" in the police release and several reports, "Tracy" in others); the prison where he was held in May 2023 (Rye Hill or Onley); and his age as given in a 2013 news report, which states two different figures.
1989 to 1994: abuses a boy at his Staffordshire home over about five years (convicted 2023).
1993: meets Samo Paull, 20, in Balsall Heath, Birmingham.
December 1993: Samo Paull is found strangled in a roadside ditch in Leicestershire, near the M1.
March 1994: Tracey Turner, 30, met at an M6 service station, is found strangled near Bitteswell, close to Lutterworth.
1997: rapes a woman at knifepoint in Weston-super-Mare; arrested, and his DNA matches samples from Tracey Turner's body.
1998: arrested for the murders.
January 1999: convicted of the 1997 rape; seven years.
March 14, 2000: convicted of both murders at Nottingham Crown Court; life, minimum term 25 years.
2012: in a police interview, calls himself a "sexual predator."
August 8, 2013: High Court refuses to reduce his minimum term.
February 13, 2023: convicted of 11 offenses against a boy at Nottingham Crown Court.
May 11, 2023: third life sentence, minimum term 10 years and 8 months.
October 2026: no later court or parole news found.