Double murderer Shaine March given whole life order after sentence ruled too lenient

Double murderer Shaine March, who stabbed his pregnant girlfriend to death while on license for a previous murder, was sentenced to life imprisonment after Court of Appeal judges ruled his sentence was “unduly lenient”.

March, then 47, was sentenced to a minimum of 42 years in prison in October 2025 after admitting to the murder of his girlfriend, Alana Odysseos.

The 32-year-old woman was pregnant with her third child when she was stabbed and slashed 23 times at her home in Walthamstow, east London, in March.

Jurors at the March trial were not told that he had previously been convicted of murder.

March was 21 when he fatally stabbed 17-year-old Andre Drummond in the neck at a McDonald’s restaurant in Denmark Hill, south London, in January 2000.

After being released on a life license in early 2013, he was recalled to prison the same year after stepping on the stomach of another pregnant girlfriend in July. He was released again in February 2018.

March also had a 1995 conviction for assault and criminal damage.

The Attorney General sent the second life sentence to the Court of Appeal; Lawyers said at the hearing on Thursday that Mart should be sentenced to life imprisonment.

March also appealed the length of his sentence, with his lawyers arguing the sentence was “manifestly excessive.”

Judge Edis, sitting with Judge Cavanagh and Judge Alice Robinson, said in a judgment: “The sentence was unduly lenient.

“We are overturning this and canceling the judge’s minimum term order and replacing it with a life sentence, meaning the offender will never be released.”

March, who watched Thursday’s hearing via video link from HMP Belmarsh in London after being told she would die behind bars, addressed members of Ms Odysseos’ family in court and said: “I just want to say I’m sorry.”

A hearing at the Old Bailey in March heard Ms Odysseos knew she had been convicted of murder through security checks by the probation service.

March, of Surrey Quays, south-east London, admitted his murder on the seventh day of his trial after an expert no longer supported his defense of diminished responsibility.

Attorney General Tom Little KC said in written submissions to the Court of Appeal that March and Ms Odysseos had been in a relationship for about four months, during which March assaulted her and prevented her from speaking to family and friends.

They also discussed her pregnancy, including in the hours before the murder on July 22, 2024, and heard Ms. Odysseos say: “I don’t want to kill my baby.”

He was later seen outside the property, clutching his right side.

The woman, covered in blood from multiple stab wounds on her body, pointed at the defendant standing nearby and shouted: “Shaine stabbed me, he stabbed me too. Help, help.”

Despite all the efforts of the police and paramedics, March walked away after Ms. Odysseos died on the ground in front of her house.

He had stab wounds on his chest, abdomen, pelvis, shoulders, hip, right arm, thighs and lower legs.

Before throwing his cellphone into the drain, March recorded a voice note saying: “Mom, I just killed a woman and I’m going back to prison.”

Sentencing him, Mr Justice Murray said the murder involved “prolonged and extreme violence” but did not consider the case to be one in which “the necessity of a life sentence is clear beyond doubt”.

He based this on four factors; these include that March suffered a traumatic brain injury when he was young, which affected his ability to regulate his emotions, and that both murders were “apparently spontaneous.”

But Mr Little told the Court of Appeal on Thursday that a life sentence was a “fair sentence” and that there was a “set of aggravating features” in the case.

He told the court: “Properly analysed, this case should never have moved beyond its classification as a full life sentence case.”

Sandip Patel KC told the court in March that the sentence was imposed in a “fair and balanced manner”.

He also said the March sentence should be reduced because of the traumatic brain injury, noting that Mr Justice Murray “did not fully respect that”.