Phillip John Smiths legal battles with Corrections costing taxpayers almost $1 million

Rachel Brand QC, defending, told the judge that Smith had indicated to her on Tuesday that he wanted to change his plea and on Wednesday that he wanted the charges read to him again. He knocked over his third victim, Carol Jordan, with his car as she walked to work at a care home. He had befriended both women in The Rainbow pub in the Digbeth area of Birmingham, where he found casual work and operated as an unlicensed taxi driver for customers. "You should clearly have faced up like a man at the overwhelming nature of the Crown's case against you but you chose to put the victims' families through misery which you compounded by this trial."

Watson said the purpose of the prison system was to improve public safety and one of the ways Corrections did that was by making sure prisoners were handled safely. Examinations of tyre impressions showed that marks on the inside of one of Rosemary Corcoran’s arms matched with some of the pattern elements of one of the tyres. Tyre impressions at the scene where her body was found were also found to match Smith’s car tyres. Blood matching each of the three victims on Smith’s belongings – including blood matching Carol Jordan and Rosemary Corcoran found on a pair of steel toe cap working boots.

Police are investigating the possibility that a man jailed for life for murdering three women could be linked to unsolved killings. The latest legal attempt is over a refusal by Corrections to let him wear a necklace in prison. Smith regularly takes legal action against Corrections for what he believes to be violations of his rights in prison. The scientist carried out an examination of the blood distribution at the scene and, while he was there, he received another call to attend the scene of another murder – that of Carol Jordan - in Birmingham. The FSS was called in to provide expert scientific support to West Midlands Police.

In 1979 he served as Business & Professional member of the Alexander Lindsay Junior Museum and served on the Board of Directors for San Ramon Community Services Group. Grace Company he donated uniforms and monetary support to the Contra Costa County Probation Department Recreational Program for their basketball team. In 1984 he joined Urban Land Institute and travelled all over the US to educational and service forums. 1987 served on San Ramon Library Foundation Board and donated the library site and offered to build the facility at his company’s cost. 1992 He served as the International Council of Shopping Centers All Star Panel Member at the Northern California Idea Exchange.

"This was a difficult case to deal with because there was so much evidence to look at. In 20 years of working for the FSS, I have never had to deal with so much in relation to one suspect - it was quite overwhelming. He added that Mrs Jordan, a care worker, had been knocked down by Mr Smith as she walked to work. "To mutilate her and leave her in such a way that the discovery of her identity would be impeded by a maximum degree. That killer was Phillip John Smith Philip Smith." He said her naked body was bundled into the back of Mr Smith's Volvo car and driven to open land at Ackers Trust, an adventure play area in Birmingham. Leicester Crown Court was told that Philip John Smith mutilated the three women almost beyond recognition. Defence counsel Rachel Brand QC asked Mr Smith if he had formed any idea of how blood, said to come from Rosemary Corcoran and Carol Jordan, had been found on the jeans.

Smith, jailed for life for murdering the father of a child he had been convicted of molesting, made international headlines in 2014 when he was released from Spring Hill Prison on a 74-hour temporary release and boarded a flight to Chili. Two women were battered to death and a third was strangled and set alight by the same killer over a four-day period, a court has been told. Senior detectives from six police forces have met to discuss possible links between a number of unsolved murders and a jailed serial killer. When Phillip John Smith left a Waikato prison on approved temporary leave in 2014 no one suspected that within days he would be leading authorities on an international man hunt. Anderson Cooper takes us on a deeply personal exploration of loss and grief.

As a result of their inquiries into Smith's background, police launched an investigation into the death of a fourth woman who was discovered to have had links to him. Patricia Lynott, a 47-year-old divorced mother of two, had moved to Birmingham from Athlone during the mid-1990s. On 23 October 2000, while she was employed at the Rainbow pub as a cleaner and to look after the licensee's children, she was found dead in the bedroom of her flat on Maxstoke Street, Bordesley Green. A post mortem failed to establish a cause of death, and her body was returned to Ireland for burial. Smith was charged with Corcoran's murder on 17 November 2000 and remanded in custody the following day.