'Sadistic' murderer Christopher McGowan who killed young mum loses bid to have sentence reduced

A murderer who killed a young mother in a brutal attack that was described as “beyond sadistic” has lost a bid to cut his minimum jail term.

Christopher McGowan, 28, savagely assaulted and murdered girlfriend Claire Inglis at her home in the St Ninians area of Stirling in November 2021.

McGowan was jailed for life by the trial judge, Michael O’Grady KC, following his conviction for the crime and ordered to serve 23 years in prison before he can seek parole.

McGowan appealed against the sentence imposed on him claiming that the 23-year minimum term, known as a punishment part, was “excessive”.

His counsel, Gordon Jackson KC, told judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh that McGowan had led a chaotic lifestyle and behaved “abominably” but argued that the 23 year minimum term imposed on him was “too long”.

He acknowledged that the murder committed by McGowan was “an act of brutality”.

Claire Inglis, 28, was found not breathing, badly bruised, with what appeared to be a baby wipe so deep in her throat the ambulance staff could not get an airway tube into her without removing it in November 2021. Facebook

But Scotland’s senior judge, the Lord Justice General, Lord Carloway, who heard the appeal with Lord Matthews and Lady Wise, said on Friday: “We are not satisfied that the punishment part is excessive and therefore the appeal is refused.”

Mr O’Grady said in sentencing McGowan last year: “It is difficult to truly convey the utter brutality of the death you inflicted on Claire Inglis.

“By the time her broken and lifeless body was found, she had no fewer than 76 separate sites of injury. The fact is, this young woman was not only murdered; she was subjected to nothing short of torture.”

“I shudder to imagine what her last minutes were like. To describe what you did as sadistic falls woefully short of the mark. It was beyond sadistic,” said the judge.

He told McGowan in sentencing him at the High Court in Edinburgh: “Even in the face of the most graphic and distressing evidence, you have shown not a flicker of emotion, not a hint of distress, not a shadow of remorse.”

The judge said the victim’s young son now spent each day “lonely, bereft and bewildered, unable to make sense of why he must grow up without his mother”.

McGowan battered and strangled Ms Inglis, 28, choked her with a baby wipe and burned her with a lighter as she lay dead or dying, jurors at his trial at the High Court in Stirling heard before convicting him of the murder.

She sustained bleeding inside her skull and extensive neck injuries during the murderous attack on her.

McGowan, who has a lengthy criminal record, including for offences of violence, was repeatedly freed by courts on bail before the fatal attack.