Lily Sullivan: Mom of teenager strangled by ‘pure evil’ killer ‘might be haunted for remainder of her life’

The person who strangled a teen to dying for rejecting his sexual advances is “pure evil”, the sufferer’s grieving mom has mentioned.

Lewis Haines was jailed for 23 years at Swansea Crown Crown Courtroom on Friday for killing Lily Sullivan, following an evening out in Wales final 12 months.

Talking after Haines was despatched to jail, Lily’s mom Anna mentioned the “precise fact” of what occurred on the night time she was killed “will hang-out me for the remainder of my life”.

Haines, a 31-year-old father-of-one met Lily, 18, at a nightclub in Pembroke, southwest Wales, on 16 December.

The pair kissed and later went to a close-by alleyway collectively the place they turned extra intimate.

Lily was later discovered face down and topless within the Mill Pond, a two-mile-long freshwater reservoir close to the city.

After finishing up the homicide, Haines walked previous Anna’s automobile as she waited at a storage to choose up her daughter from her night time out.

Anna mentioned Haines “appeared me straight within the eyes understanding what he had accomplished”.

“The occasions of the night time Lily died go over in my thoughts continuously and I get up within the night time picturing Lily within the water questioning if she knew what was occurring, if she was scared,” she mentioned after the sentencing.

“I want I had stopped Lily going out that night time. I image the person answerable for her dying after I noticed him on the storage, and I want I had confronted him.

“Figuring out I used to be that near her, I want I would bought out of my automobile and walked. I at all times marvel if I may have saved her.”

Haines confessed to murdering Lily however denied sexual misconduct.

However after a trial of info, choose Paul Thomas QC concluded Haines had killed {the teenager} after she rebuffed his sexual advances.

The courtroom was informed how Lily made a name to her mom at round 2.47am, telling her she could be along with her quickly.

The decision was minimize off mid-sentence and the prosecution mentioned that it believed that “Lily was attacked at that time”.

“He appeared me straight within the eyes understanding what he had accomplished,” Ms Sullivan added. “I really feel now that this was Lily making an attempt to inform me one thing and reaching out to me, which is insufferable.

“I query what occurred when her cellphone went useless after I was talking to her, what I may have accomplished in another way so she’d nonetheless be alive.

“I play that complete night time time and again in my head – it is like being tortured considering only one choice may have modified the entire night time.”

She added: “These ideas by no means depart me and I can not cease fascinated with it. I’ve to reside with the truth that I now by no means know what actually occurred to Lily that night time.

“I think the precise fact will hang-out me for the remainder of my life.”

Sentencing Haines, choose Paul Thomas QC mentioned: “You strangled her face-to-face, she should have been terrified.

“An 18-year-old woman on their own in the dead of night with a strong man,” he continued. “She was completely at your mercy and also you, Lewis Haines, confirmed her none.

“You have been completely fascinated with your personal self-preservation.”

He mentioned Lily’s dying had prompted “devastation to many”.