Life for father who killed family

Neil Crampton, 36, was convicted of four counts of murder at Newcastle Crown Court after a jury rejected his defence of diminished responsibility.

He hacked to death his 12-year-old daughter Abigail Crampton, her five-year-old brother Steven, their mother Olufunke Sobo, 36, and her brother Yemi, 41, in a rage after learning his on-off relationship with Ms Sobo was finally over.

Crampton was jealous and possessive of Ms Sobo, also known as Funke or Liz, and could not come to terms with the fact that their on-off relationship was coming to an end.

He struck on the night before her mother Omotunde Sobo, known as Tunde, was returning from a holiday in her native Nigeria, which may have been a trigger as he realised a reconciliation was even less likely when she came home.

Ms Sobo and the children shared Mrs Sobo's semi-detached home in Hawthorn Gardens, and she turned up in a taxi to find her street cordoned off. Police had been alerted by a 999 call made by Crampton, in which he confessed: "I've murdered my entire family."

He fled afterwards, and was arrested hours later outside his parents' house where he was living. Officers were concerned he might even have killed them too, judging from the desperate call he made to police. But Bill and Ann Crampton were safe and well, buying Christmas presents for their grandchildren.

On November 13 he went to Ms Sobo's house and, shortly before midnight, neighbours heard screaming. He said he attacked his ex-partner with a knife and then fought her brother as he came to her aid. Mr Sobo, a 41-year-old sickle cell anaemia sufferer, was staying with his mother while his flat in Gosforth was being refurbished.

After stabbing them, Crampton said he went upstairs and knifed his daughter, who tried to defend herself, then killed Steven who was asleep. After that, he tried several times to kill himself, before he was finally arrested by armed police.

During the trial, it was claimed he wrote 666 on his arm the day before the attacks. He never gave police a satisfactory explanation why he did not spare his children after slaughtering the adults.