AN OBSESSED killer who strangled his ex-girlfriend to death was yesterday jailed for life for her murder.

Alan Pickersgill, 37, was handed the mandatory life sentence for the murder of Julie Bywater at Winchester Crown Court.

The former carpenter was told he would serve a minimum of 19 years before he would be considered for release.

Pickersgill strangled the popular teaching assistant, 32, with a plastic cable tie at his flat in Wayside Road, Southbourne, on the night of May 4 last year.

He had developed a dangerous obsession with Ms Bywater in the wake of a brief romance between the pair, who had got to know each other on a college massage course.

Handing down the sentence, Judge Guy Boney told Pickersgill he had displayed “selfishness beyond belief” to someone who had shown him nothing but kindness.

He said: “You were obsessed with Julie and continuing the relationship with her.

“Given the real threat of her finding a relationship elsewhere, rather than let her fall into the hands of a different lover you would see to it that such a thing could never happen.”

In an impact statement read to the court, Christine Bywater, Julie’s mother, said her daughter had been “cruelly, unnecessarily and selfishly” taken from her.

She said: “He (Pickersgill) has taken away the one true love of my life. I am normally a very forgiving person, but I want him to feel some of the pain he has caused me.

“Until now I have never understood the meaning of the word hate – I do now.”

In mitigation, Susan Evans QC insisted there had been a lack of pre-meditation to the attack and that the intent may only have been formed seconds before the murder.

She also cited Pickersgill’s previous lack of convictions and his obsessive, anxious personality.

Though the jury had failed to reach a verdict on a separate charge of rape, Anthony Donne QC, said the prosecution “entirely rejected” any suggestion sexual contact prior to the killing was consensual.

Pickersgill denied the rape.