Killer released after 43 years behind bars

 One of Britain’s longest serving prisoners has been released after 43 years behind bars.

John Massey, who was 26 when he was jailed for life in 1975 for murder after shooting Charlie Higgins, a pub doorman, in Clapton, east London, was freed from HMP Warren Hill in Suffolk on Wednesday.

Now 69, the killer had escaped several times, once from Pentonville in 2012, to say goodbye to his mother on her deathbed, and was on the run in Spain between 1994 and 1997.

The only prisoners who have spent longer behind bars include Robert Maudsley – known as Hannibal the Cannibal – in prison since 1973, and Charles Bronson, the self-styled “most violent prisoner in Britain”, now called Charles Salvador.

The release of Massey was revealed after a decision by the Parole Board last week. “I’ve served my time now,” he told the Camden New Journal. “I have always deeply regretted the crime I committed and am aware of the consequences and the suffering it caused.

“It happened in a moment of madness. I have served my sentence with remorse and am thankful the Parole Board have come to the decision that I should now be released.”

His solicitor, John Turner, said: “John comes from an extremely tight-knit family, who have supported him through his many years in prison.”

He said that Massey now posed no danger to the public, adding: “I hope that lessons have been learnt from what is indisputably a very sad case.”

Massey will have to live at a halfway house in London as part of his parole conditions.