Frome man Kieron Goodwin jailed for killing partner Olivia Wood

A man who plied his girlfriend with a lethal dose of cocaine before strangling her on the night she tried to leave him has been jailed for at least 35 years.

Kieron Goodwin, 33, was found guilty last month of murdering 29-year-old Olivia Wood at his flat in Frome, Somerset, on 30 July last year.

Goodwin had quickly become controlling of Ms Wood during their three-month relationship, including forcing her to take drugs, perform sex acts on camera for other men and sleep with a stranger.

Jailing Goodwin at Bristol Crown Court, Judge Martin Picton described him as a “truly evil individual”.

On the night Ms Wood died, she had packed her belongings into a suitcase and rucksack, suggesting she was preparing to leave him.

In a victim impact statement, Ms Wood’s mother Astrid described Olivia as “my sunshine, my love, my heart”.

“I miss her voice, her laugh, her warmth, her stories from work, her experiences with the little animals that she loved so much. There was always a beetle or a bumblebee to rescue,” she said.

“I feel sick, I’m limping inside with pain. I gave life to Olivia and now one person on this earth was allowed to take her life away.

“Our family will never recover from her death and the knowledge of the awful ordeal of her last few months when you [Goodwin] drew her into into a dark world of your own devising.”

Goodwin had admitted coercively controlling Ms Wood but denied her murder.

He has never given an explanation for her death, and did not give evidence at trial.

Goodwin was also sentenced for a string of offences against three former partners, including forcing them to take drugs and sleep with strangers against their will.

Ms Wood, an ecologist based in Liverpool, never formally moved in with Goodwin, but a spent a lot of time with him in Frome.

She never spoke to anyone about the situation she was in, but notes on her phone revealed that she was deeply unhappy.

Goodwin called 999 at 02:50 BST on 30 July to say Ms Wood was not breathing, but while he did so, he was simultaneously deleting hundreds of “potentially incriminating” photos and videos from his phone, the trial heard.

A post-mortem examination revealed Ms Wood had a potentially fatal level of cocaine in her system, and the hyoid bone in her neck was fractured – an injury often associated with fatal neck compression.

Jailing Goodwin for life with a minimum term of 35 years for Olivia’s death, Judge Picton said: “You are a manipulative, determined, misogynistic, selfish narcissist and a truly evil individual.

“The term ‘evil’ is not a superlative to be used lightly but in your case it is thoroughly deserved.”

In addition he handed Goodwin three life sentences with a minimum term of 18 years, to run concurrently, for offences against his other victims.

“All of them were victims of your coercive and controlling behaviour,” the judge added.

“You were able to get your hooks in them, and having done so you were determined not to let them go.”

Goodwin’s three other victims told the BBC that his relationships would always follow the same pattern of “love bombing” his victims with adoration, before telling them he was struggling with his mental health.

He would pressure them into handing over their savings to support him, most of which would fund a cocaine habit.

Goodwin would then systematically isolate them from their friends and family, bully them into taking drugs, sleeping with other men and performing sex for strangers on camera for his pleasure.

They said that the deep sense of shame and confusion they felt made it impossible for them to seek help.

In a victim impact statement, one said: “I lost everything I cared about by being with (Goodwin). When I finally left him for good, there was almost no trace of the old me left.”

Goodwin was also convicted of trying to strangle the victim when she tried to leave him, although at the time he pressured her into dropping the her complaint to the police.

“This is the biggest regret of my life to date, and I have lived with the regret of choosing to do that for years,” she said.

Another described the terror she felt every time Goodwin forced her to sleep with a stranger, that she was going to be “hurt, or raped, or worse”.

“I live in fear that he will be let out, fear that he will be given the chance to continue harming women,” she said.

“He is not remorseful, he’s not sorry, he’s enjoying this – that’s who he is. He’s sorry he got caught and he idea he could be allowed back into the world, free to hurt someone else, is something I can’t bear.”

The third woman said: “My life has been spent in survival mode, and somehow I have continued to survive.

“I feel very trapped in my current life and still feel overwhelmed and anxious about what the future holds for me. My future still seems unfathomable, scary and daunting to me.”