Rachel Tunstill ,a mum who stabbed newborn baby girl to death with scissors dies in Prison
Tunstill has now died at HMP Styal in Cheshire where she was serving a life sentence, the Prison Service confirmed.
A spokesperson said: “HMP Styal prisoner Rachel Tunstill died in custody on 1 August 2023.
“As with all deaths in custody, the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will investigate.”
Tunstill was first convicted of murder in June 2017 and handed a life sentence.
That conviction was overturned a year later by the Court of Appeal after judges ruled the jury should have been offered a lesser alternative charge of infanticide.
The killer mum then went before the courts again and was found guilty of murder in February 2019 for a second time.
She was jailed for life with a minimum of 17 years.
Tunstill secretly gave birth to Mia while her unsuspecting boyfriend Ryan played computer games in the next room.
The university masters graduate in forensic psychology even asked Ryan for a pair of scissors, which she then used to kill the baby.
Tragically, the tot had been born alive but died after being stabbed in the back, neck and chest.
She then dumped the baby in a bag and told her partner, who thought she was only a few weeks pregnant, that she had miscarried.
Police arrested her after she went to hospital for a check up and medics found she was still carrying the baby’s umbilical chord and placenta.
Sentencing in 2019, Mr Justice King, said: “This must have been a sustained and frenzied attack on a victim who because of her age was particularly vulnerable.
“Her duty to her newborn baby was to cradle and comfort her – not to stab her to death.”
