CONVICTED murderer Kevin Nunn is set to lodge an appeal against his conviction for killing his former girlfriend and setting her body alight.The 45-year-old salesman, formerly of Wrights Way in Woolpit, was given 22 years in jail after being found guilty by a jury at Ipswich Crown Court on Monday of murdering 37-year-old Dawn Walker.

By James Mortlock

CONVICTED murderer Kevin Nunn is set to lodge an appeal against his conviction for killing his former girlfriend and setting her body alight.

The 45-year-old salesman, formerly of Wrights Way in Woolpit, was given 22 years in jail after being found guilty by a jury at Ipswich Crown Court on Monday of murdering 37-year-old Dawn Walker.

The body of Miss Walker, an avid fitness enthusiast and scuba diver, was discovered by a dog walker next to the River Lark, in Fornham, near Bury St Edmunds, on February 4 last year.

During the seven week trial, the prosecution claimed Nunn took Miss Walker's body to Duck Sluice Farm in Fornham Park and, after taping it to railings, set it alight with petrol causing 95 per cent burns.

The body was then removed before being dumped close to a footpath near the River Lark, where it was later found.

But yesterday, Nunn's solicitor Kevin McCarthy revealed an appeal against the conviction was already being considered.

The Bury St Edmunds-based lawyer, who this year celebrated 25 years as a solicitor, said: “I am as certain as certain can be.

“An appeal is being considered at this time, but it is only three days after the result.”

Mr McCarthy would not divulge the grounds on which an appeal would be based.

It is understood the legal challenge, if lodged at crown court, will be based on a matter of law as opposed to new evidence having been unearthed.

Nunn's family are standing by him and maintain he is innocent of Miss Walker's murder.

His sister Brigitte Butcher, of Bury St Edmunds, described the Crown Prosecution Service and Suffolk Police's case as an “incomplete jigsaw”.

She added: “Yes there is someone out there, the true perpetrator or perpetrators. We are bewildered at the verdict and it is a sad and disturbing day for the British justice system.”

Robert Sadd, the Crown Prosecution Service's prosecutor in the case, said: “He would have 28 days to lodge an appeal, but they can only appeal on a point of law, not on the evidence put before the jury. “They could also appeal if new evidence came to light.”

He said the investigation into Miss Walker's murder was a painstaking exercise in which 6,500 documents were gathered together and how the decision to arrest and then charge Nunn was not “made lightly”.

Detective Superintendent Roy Lambert, lead officer in the case, said although it had been “a very difficult investigation” he was happy both with the case and the result adding: “The fact of the matter is the evidence kept leading back to Kevin Nunn.”