Bulger killer 'defied ban on visiting Liverpool'

Jon Venables defied a ban on visiting the city where he murdered toddler James Bulger, it was reported yesterday.

The 27-year-old has visited nightclubs and a pop concert in Liverpool and even watched Premier League side Everton at Goodison Park, the Daily Mirror said. But he has reportedly not visited Bootle, the city district where he and Robert Thompson snatched James 17 years ago and took him off to his death.

After being released on licence and with a new identity in 2001, Venables was ordered not to return to Merseyside, among a series of other conditions.

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It emerged this week that the killer was recalled to custody for breaching his licence.

Ministers are refusing to give details about what he did, despite growing demands for more information.

Victims’ rights champion Helen Newlove, whose husband Garry was kicked to death by a gang of yobs outside their home in Warrington in 2007, said it was cruel not to tell James Bulger’s parents the full details.

She urged the Prime Minister to think again after he and Justice Secretary Jack Straw declared the new allegations must remain secret.

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Mrs Newlove said: “What Jack Straw has said is ludicrous. Venables has breached his parole and should be staying in jail.

“Venables and Thompson have been given everything on a plate and now we’re not even allowed to know the circumstances surrounding this – it is a disgrace.”

Venables was taken back to prison last week after reportedly fighting with a work colleague and developing a drug problem.

In 1993 he and Robert Thompson, both just 10 at the time, led two-year-old James from a Liverpool shopping centre on a two-mile walk to his death. They battered the little boy and left his body on a railway track.

Yesterday the Prime Minister said that although he understood the public “outrage” the Government would not comment on individual cases.