FAMILIES of murder victims last night called for a review of parole rules after it emerged the convicted killer of three children has been allowed out of jail on unescorted trips in Liverpool.

David McGreavy, from Southport, was given life after he murdered a nine-month-old baby and two young sibling s at their Worcester home, more than three decades ago.

Yesterday, it emerged the 54-year-old, who was baby-sitting the children when he butchered them, has been staying in a bail hostel in Liverpool while on temporary release from prison.

During the past six weeks he has been seen mingling with city centre shoppers and surfing the Internet at a cafe in the Clayton Square shopping centre off Church Street, while on visits from Ford Prison in West Sussex.

Last night, campaigners called for a change in the law to ensure a life sentence mean killers must spend the rest of their lives in jail, in the most extreme cases.

Marie McCourt, co-ordinator of Samm (Support after Murder and Manslaughter) Merseyside, whose 22-year-old daughter Helen was murdered 18 years ago, said: "I am very concerned that people who have committed appalling crimes like this can go free, especially after the way he is supposed to have behaved during his prison sentence.

"He does not seem to have shown any remorse for the horrendous nature of the crimes he committed.

"The parole board should be seen to be doing their job properly. Are they really taking into account what psychiatrists are saying before a killer of this calibre is released?

"They have to be made accountable for their decision if through their actions another child's life is taken."

Liverpool Riverside MP Louise Ellman said she would be putting questions to the Home Office to gain reassurance that her constituents would be safe from McGreavy.

She said: "I look at these as individual cases, but with such horrendous violence, there is a real concern whether he is a danger to the public.

McGreavy was dubbed the monster of Worcester after he killed the three children of Dorothy Urry at their home, where he was lodging.

He attacked the youngest child Samantha, nine months, because she was crying. He smashed her head against a wall and then killed her with a razor.

Then he used the weapon to murder her two-year-old sister Dawn before strangling her brother Paul, four, with curtain wire.

He mutilated the children's bodies, before impaling them on a neighbour's railing.

McGreavy was jailed for life at Worcester Crown Court in July, 1973, the judge warning he was "a very dangerous man" guilty of unspeakable brutality.

Yesterday devastated Mrs Urry, 54, who now lives in Andover, Hants, was reported to have wept as she described her feelings at the killer's release 32 years on.

She said: "I cannot believe it. This man took three children's lives. He should have got the electric chair.

"I wouldn't trust him near any kids. It's just not safe."

She added: "Hearing that he has been allowed to walk the streets just brings the horror back. It's terribly wrong, he could do it again."

But others called for calm, after the Home Office said McGreavy would not be on release if he was a danger to the public.

Among them were Professor Roger Evans, head of the law school at Liverpool John Moores University and city barrister David Turner QC, who urged the public to have confidence in the system that monitors murderers' behaviour before and after release.

City solicitor Helen Broughton, president of the Liverpool Law Society and head of family law at Morecrofts, called for more clarity from the Home Office to reassure people about how convicted murderers are assessed.

She said: "As a society we need to decide whether punishment is for retribution or whether it is in the hope of redemption in the future.

"If everyone was in favour of retribution then life would mean life and we would be back in favour of hanging, which the Government has repeatedly debated and rejected.

"We need more clarity from the Home Office about how they assess people as being fit for release.

"At the end of the day it's very easy to have sympathy for this poor mother, because the loss of her children is with her forever.

"But I think the public needs more information so we can take an opinion on it. Perhaps then we can dissipate some of the understandable fear that people experience when something like this happens."

Mr Turner, head of Exchange Chambers in Liverpool said: "Life does mean life in the sense that the offender remains subject to the life sentence and can be recalled at any time without a trial.

"So if it is believed that the person has in any way breached their parole or is not acting within the terms of their release then he can be brought back into prison by executive action.

"That's the penalty that lifers fear most, the fact that they could always be recalled on an allegation - it doesn't have to be proven in a court of law.

"The fact is you have to allow these people out at some stage. People should be reassured these mechanisms are in place."

Prof Evans, an expert in criminal justice, warned the public against vigilante action.

He said: "He would not have been let out on licence unless there had been a comprehensive risk assessment and presumably the normal provisions will be made. If he breaks any of those conditions, he will be recalled to prison. That is what the law and the legal system are for. They are there to set standards.

"I would be adamantly opposed to a vengeance approach, where individuals outside of any legal framework or criminal justice process were able to seek revenge."

Over the past six weeks, McGreavy has been leaving Ford open prison in Sussex and travelling to Liverpool to stay in a hostel on the edge of the city as probation officers prepare him for release.

On the day he was sighted in Liverpool, McGreavy surfed the web at an Internet cafe in Clayton Square shopping centre, and even took part in a consumer survey.

The terms of his trial release mean he is banned from drinking or going into pubs and he spent his days walking the streets from 7am until nightfall.

Rose Dixon, national training and development officer for Samm, said : "I was appalled when I heard what he (McGreavy) had done.

"In cases like that, life should mean life. In his case, there is a possibility that he could kill again. Imagine how the victims' family would feel if that happened."

Speaking on behalf of hundreds of families which Samm supports and represents to the Home Office, Mrs Dixon said: "I think we are going too far the other way now because there are a lot of discussions about the human rights of the offenders.

"We have got to stop and think about the human rights of the dead victim and the bereaved family.

"How can you be expected to live a normal family life in peace, which we are entitled to under European human rights, when you know the killer of your loved one is loose?"

Mrs McCourt, from Billinge, contacts the parole board at Full Sutton prison in Yorkshire each year to hear if her daughter's killer Ian Simms, who continues to protest his innocence, is to be released.

She added: "The public needs to be assured that David McGreavy will be monitored very closely, and we need to know what steps have been taken to make sure this person is safe to be released back into the community."

A Home Office spokeswoman confirmed that McGreavy was jailed for life in 1973 but said she could not discuss the case further.

She said: "All prisoners will be fully risk-assessed before being moved to an open prison or being allowed out of prison on a temporary licence. It's a tightly managed process.

"(It) happens as part of our commitment to rehabilitate prisoners, to help them re-integrate into society and also to test them."

Ms Broughton added: "The problem is what do we do with these people?

"There are questions about whether we should publicly bail these people when they come out, should they wear a uniform like they do in the US? Is that going to be part of their sentence?

"As far as him being free to go around the streets where children are, we don't know how he has been assessed, so we can't make an informed judgement."

One of the notes on McGreavy's prison record shows he once picked a fight with Moors Murderer Ian Brady to prove he was the "most notorious", when the pair were both held at Wormwood Scrubs.

A report prepared by psychologist Michael Heaps in 2002, says: "McGreavy resolved to stand up to Ian Brady.

"But other people I have spoken to have made a more sinister interpretation of this confrontation, namely that it was due to a conflict of status between two notorious child murderers."

In a chilling echo of the events of 1973, it emerged McGreavy has currently been befriended by another woman who has taken him under her wing.

Fiona Hartless and her husband David reportedly know that McGreavy killed three children but have offered him him a place to live upon his release with them and their two children, at their home in Dorset.

deborahjames@dailypost.co.uk

Barbaric murders and mutilation of three children sent shock waves through the nation

THE crimes of David McGreavy shocked the nation in the 1970s.

He was jailed for life for the barbaric murders and mutilation of the three children, aged nine months, two and four, at Worcester Crown Court in July, 1973.

The court heard how McGreavy was invited to live at the house of lorry driver Clive Ralph and his barmaid wife Dorothy, after he was forced out of the Royal Navy and became homeless.

After a heavy drinking session, baby-sitter McGreavy killed four-month-old Samantha. When the child refused to stop crying he swung her repeatedly against a wall shattering her skull.

He then battered to death the baby's sister Dawn, aged two, and their four-year-old brother, Paul.

McGreavy was arrested the next day after sleeping rough in nearby woods.

In a statement to police, McGreavy said: "I picked her out of the cot, tried to nurse her to stop crying. She still wouldn't so I cut off her breath. I picked up a razor blade and used it on her.

"I did the same to Dawn and I strangled Paul with a piece of curtain wire. I was going to bury them but changed my mind and picked up a pickaxe and used it on them.

"I then took them into the garden and stuck them on a fence and then left."

Judge Mr Justice Ashworth accepted McGreavy's guilty plea and recommended he serve a minimum of 20 years.

After sending McGrevy down he wrote to the Home Secretary drawing his attention to the brutality of the crime.

He wrote: "It was a surprise to everyone in the case that none of the doctors who examined McGreavy could find anything which would support the plea that he was insane or suffering from impairment of mental responsibility.

"In the absence of evidence, McGreavy must in my view be regarded as a very dangerous man."