Wife fails in bid for killer's child

A woman who married a murderer during his prison sentence has failed in her bid to have his child by artificial insemination.

Lorraine Dickson, 45, from Beverley, east Yorkshire, was serving a jail term when she met Kirk Dickson, 31, in 1999 through the prison service's pen pal scheme.

He cannot apply for release on licence until 2009 but Mrs Dickson said she is desperate to have a child before then.

But on Friday the High Court refused to accept the couple's desire to have a child "trumped all other considerations."

Rights violated

Mrs Dickson, whose husband is being held at Dovegate Prison in Staffordshire, already has three children by other relationships.

Her barrister, Miss Flo Krause, criticised the Home Office's refusal to allow artificial insemination as a violation of her fundamental human rights.

But Mr Justice Pitchford said that officials were legitimately concerned that the relationship had not been tested outside of prison.

He added that inmates had no fundamental right to undergo fertility treatment.

Mrs Dickson is now planning to take her case to the European Court of Human Rights where a similar case is due to be heard later this year.