Man killed mother of his newborn child before asking internet lover to be his girlfriend

Mark Mahoney has been jailed for life for the murder of his girlfriend Vikki Hull at her father's home in Liverpool

Mark Mahoney changed his plea to guilty the day before his trial was due to begin at Liverpool Crown Court (Getty Images)

A man wrote online messages to a woman asking to start a relationship just hours after murdering the mother of his newborn daughter.

Mark Mahoney has been jailed for life for murdering Vikki Hull at her father’s home in Speke, Liverpool in April this year after the couple returned home from a family barbecue.

Shortly after midnight Ms Hull’s father Jack went upstairs to bed on 8 April and returned downstairs at 3am when he found his 29-year-old daughter unconscious on the sofa and called an ambulance.

During the period Mr Hull had been asleep Mahoney had punched and strangled the mother of his six-week old daughter on the sofa and left the house.

He first went to a local retail park before texting a friend to ask if he could stay the night at his flat as he had “f***ed up really bad”, the Liverpool Echo reported.

In WhatsApp messages sent at 3:56am on 9 April, which were produced as evidence at Liverpool Crown Court, Mahoney said “I wanna come an be with u babe, can i please? [sic]”.

The woman, who had never meet Mahoney in real life and lived in Birmingham, responded an hour later saying: “Sos was asleep wots happened??? Thought u was ok again xxxxxxxxxxx”

He immediately responded: “No, do u still want us to give it a go? Do u still want me to come down there?”.

An hour and a half earlier, at 2:21am, he had texted his friend Robbie Graham saying: “Ur gonna hate me n want nothing to do with me rob”.

He went to spend the night in Mr Graham’s spare room but the court was told he did not tell him about the murder.

Mahoney then went with Mr Graham to the home of another woman, described as the pair’s “surrogate mother”, where they tried to convince him he could patch up his relationship with Ms Hull – unaware that she was dead.

He later contacted his mother, who was looking after his daughter at a different address, who eventually persuaded him to hand himself in.

Mahoney, who has previous convictions for attacking two different women, initially told police Ms Hull had attacked him after they had an argument about their child but no evidence that he was acting in self-defence has ever emerged.

He said he then grabbed her by the throat “to scare her” but she soon stopped breathing.

After that he panicked, fled and claims he only realised she was dead when he read a news article about the incident.

Mahoney initially pleaded not guilty to murder but changed his plea the day before the trial was due to begin.

Passing sentence, Judge Alan Conrad QC said: “Vikki Hull was 29 years of age when she was murdered by you on the 9th of April this year. She was greatly loved by those who knew her and had everything to live for.

“Only six-and-a-half weeks earlier she had given birth to a baby girl, Rosie Leigh.

“Vikki will never see her daughter grow up, and Rosie Leigh will never know her mother.”

Mahoney was handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 15 years and 219 days.