Mark Bridger was convicted at Mold Crown Court on May 30, 2013 of the murder of April Jones, a child from Machynlleth in Wales, in October 2012. The jury also convicted him of child abduction and of perverting the course of justice. The trial judge imposed life imprisonment with a whole life order for the murder, so that he can be released only in exceptional circumstances.
The trial lasted about five weeks. Bridger denied murder throughout. His later application to challenge the whole life order was abandoned before it was heard, and he was named in the Court of Appeal's judgment of February 2014 on whole life orders as an applicant who had withdrawn.
Bridger was born on November 6, 1965 in Surrey, in the south of England, and moved to Wales as a young man. By 2012 he was living near Machynlleth and was 46 years old.
The child came from Machynlleth, in Wales, and the offenses against her took place there on October 1, 2012. The trial was held at Mold Crown Court.
Dyfed-Powys Police arrested Bridger on the afternoon of Tuesday October 2, 2012 on suspicion of abduction. The force opened a major inquiry. On the afternoon of Saturday October 6, 2012 the force announced at a press conference that he had been charged with murder, child abduction and perverting the course of justice. The announcement followed advice from a District Crown Prosecutor of the Crown Prosecution Service in Wales, who said there was sufficient evidence to charge and that charging was in the public interest.
He appeared before magistrates in Aberystwyth on the Monday that followed.
On January 14, 2013 Bridger appeared at Mold Crown Court and pleaded not guilty to the charges of abduction and murder. At a plea management hearing before the trial it was recorded that he denied murder. The trial had been fixed for February, but on February 25, 2013 the trial judge agreed to adjourn it at the defense's request so that further inquiries could be made, and fixed the new date of April 29, 2013. The judge also ordered that nothing said at that hearing could be reported.
Jury selection was set to begin at Mold Crown Court on April 29, 2013, and the trial opened that week. Evidence was heard over about five weeks.
The jury of nine women and three men retired and, after four hours and six minutes, returned unanimous verdicts on all three counts: guilty of child abduction, guilty of murder and guilty of perverting the course of justice.
The trial judge sentenced Bridger on the same day, May 30, 2013. He said that for the offense of murder he sentenced Bridger to life imprisonment with a whole life order, and that there would be no separate penalties on counts one and three. He described the seriousness of the offending as exceptionally high. He noted that Bridger had no relevant previous conviction, but concluded that there could be only one sentence.
The judge's remarks were published by the Judicial Office with some passages redacted under section 39 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933.
In December 2013 it was reported that Bridger intended to challenge the whole life order. A specially constituted Court of Appeal was convened to hear several whole life cases together, and Bridger was among the applicants. On January 13, 2014 the Judicial Office for England and Wales confirmed that he had abandoned his application for permission to appeal against the sentence, and a hearing that had been due later that month did not go ahead for him. His conviction was not challenged.
On February 18, 2014 the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division), with the Lord Chief Justice giving the judgment, decided the cases that remained. It held that judges may continue to impose whole life orders under Schedule 21 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 in exceptional cases.
A whole life order is the most severe sentence available to an English or Welsh court for murder. Schedule 21 to the Criminal Justice Act 2003 sets out the starting points for the minimum term of a mandatory life sentence, and it allows a judge to specify that the offender will never be released on the ordinary tariff basis.
The lawfulness of the order was tested in the months after Bridger's sentence. The European Court of Human Rights, in Vinter v United Kingdom, found that English law did not clearly provide for a review of such sentences. In February 2014 the Court of Appeal disagreed. It held that section 30 of the Crime (Sentences) Act 1997 gives the Secretary of State a power to release whole life prisoners on exceptional grounds, which makes the regime compatible with Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, and it described whole life orders as exceptional cases, likely to be rare. Whole life prisoners can therefore be considered for release only where circumstances have changed so much that the original punishment is no longer justified.
Bridger's defense at trial was a denial of murder. The jury rejected it on all three counts, and his application to appeal the sentence was abandoned before a hearing. His conviction was not challenged.
In July 2013, after sentence, Bridger was held in England and was serving the whole life order.
November 6, 1965: Mark Bridger is born in Surrey.
October 1, 2012: The offenses take place in Machynlleth, Wales.
October 2, 2012: Dyfed-Powys Police arrest Bridger on suspicion of abduction.
October 6, 2012: Bridger is charged with murder, child abduction and perverting the course of justice.
January 14, 2013: He pleads not guilty at Mold Crown Court.
February 25, 2013: The trial is adjourned at the defense's request; a new date of April 29, 2013 is fixed.
April 29, 2013: Jury selection begins at Mold Crown Court.
May 30, 2013: Unanimous guilty verdicts; life imprisonment with a whole life order.
December 2013: Bridger indicates he will seek to appeal the sentence.
January 13, 2014: The Judicial Office confirms he has abandoned his application.
February 18, 2014: The Court of Appeal rules on whole life orders in the remaining cases.