Double murderer Shaine March, who stabbed his pregnant girlfriend to death while on licence for a previous murder, has been handed a whole life order after Court of Appeal judges ruled his sentence was “unduly lenient”.
March, then 47, was jailed for at least 42 years in October 2025 after admitting the murder of his girlfriend, Alana Odysseos.
The 32-year-old was pregnant with her third child when March stabbed and slashed her 23 times at her home in Walthamstow, east London.
Jurors in March’s trial were not told that he had been convicted of murder before.
March was aged 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.
Following his release on a life licence in early 2013, he was recalled to jail later that year after he stamped on the stomach of another pregnant girlfriend in July. He was released again in February 2018.
March also had convictions for assault and criminal damage in 1995.
The solicitor general referred his second life sentence to the Court of Appeal, with barristers telling a hearing on Thursday that March should have been given a whole life order.
March also challenged the length of his sentence, with his barristers claiming it was “manifestly excessive”.
In a ruling, Lord Justice Edis, sitting with Mr Justice Cavanagh and Judge Alice Robinson, said: “The sentence was unduly lenient.
“We quash it, and we quash the minimum term order that the judge made, and substitute in its place a whole life order, which means that the offender will never be released.”
After being told he would die behind bars, March, who watched Thursday’s proceedings via a videolink from HMP Belmarsh in London, addressed members of Odysseos’ family in court and said: “I just want to say that I am sorry.”
March’s trial at the Old Bailey heard that Odysseos knew about his murder conviction, with safeguarding checks made by probation services.
March, of Surrey Quays, southeast London, admitted to her murder on the seventh day of his trial after an expert no longer supported his defence of diminished responsibility.
Tom Little KC, for the solicitor general, told the Court of Appeal in written submissions that March and Odysseos had been in a relationship for around four months, during which time March attacked her and stopped her from talking to family and friends.
They also argued about her pregnancy, including in the hours before the murder on 22 July 2024, with Odysseos heard to say: “I don’t want to kill my baby.”
She was later seen outside the property, clutching her right side.
Bleeding from multiple stab wounds to her body, she pointed at the defendant standing nearby and shouted: “Shaine stabbed me, he stabbed me. Help, help.”
March walked away as Odysseos died on the ground outside her home despite the efforts of police and paramedics.
She had suffered stab wounds to her chest, stomach, pelvis, shoulders, buttocks, right arm, thighs and lower legs.
Before throwing his mobile phone in a drain, March recorded a voice note saying: “Mum, I just killed a woman, and I’m going back to jail.”
Sentencing him, Mr Justice Murray said the murder involved “prolonged and excessive violence” but that he did not consider the case to be one where “the need for lifelong imprisonment is clear beyond doubt”.
He based this on four factors, including that March suffered a traumatic brain injury when he was a teenager, 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 whole life order was “just punishment” and that there was a “constellation of aggravating features” in the case.
In court, he said: “Properly analysed, this case should never have left the categorisation as a whole life order case.”
Sandip Patel KC, for March, told the court that the sentence was reached in a “fair and balanced manner”.
He also said that March’s sentence should be reduced on the grounds of his traumatic brain injury, stating that Mr Justice Murray “did not give it the fullest regard”.
