‘My sister’s murderer will be free at 57 because of an outdated law’

When Katie Brett heard the judge hand David Minto a sentence of 35 years minimum for the murder of her 16-year-old sister Sasha Marsden, she was in shock.  

Sasha, a fun-loving, caring and popular college student, was lured to a Blackpool hotel in January 2013 by Minto, 22, on the pretense of a job interview. 

He then attacked her, stabbing her 58 times, raped her and set her on fire. Her body was so badly damaged police had to identify her by the DNA from her toothbrush. 

Sasha’s family believe that Minto should have been given a lifetime sentence. As it stands, he will be eligible for parole at the age of 57.

But the family currently have no way of appealing her killer’s sentence due to legal restrictions.

Under the law, there is a short window for to appeal an unduly lenient sentence. Currently, it is 28 days after it has been handed to the defendant.

It’s a deadline Katie says her family were unaware of, and one they would have been in too much ‘grief’ to meet. 

Now Katie wants to tackle this issue so other families do not have the same heartache.

She has launched a new petition calling for this to change, arguing that the amount of time the victim’s family has to appeal should be proportionate to the length of the sentence.

She told Metro: ‘The legal system is biased towards offenders.’

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A convicted offender is allowed more time than 28 days in to appeal their sentence, if they can prove mitigating circumstances, which happened in case of Minto.

He appealed his own sentence outside of the 28 day limit, on the grounds that his barrister had been unwell, and argued that he had only intended to rape his victim, and not kill her.

His appeal then was thrown out by the Court of Appeal in February 2014, but his minimum 35 year sentence did not become a whole life order either.

‘This 28-day limit is a sign that violence against women is not taken as seriously as it should be by the law,’ Katie said.

‘He will only be 57 when he is released. And at 57 you can still get married and have children. He can still go on and have a full life, when he has taken Sasha’s.

‘He will still have the strength in him to go and murder someone else. He could still target another teenage girl, who has not even been born yet.’

Sasha was a ‘typical teenager’; a ‘fun-loving girl’ who was described by her family as a ‘beautiful sister’ and a ‘precious daughter’ who ‘gave the most amazing cuddles.’

She was studying child care at a local college in Blackpool when she was contacted by Minto, who she had met through a mutual friend on a night out the previous year, asking if she was interested in a part-time job at a nearby hotel.

The Grafton House Hotel was owned by his girlfriend and her mother, but Minto did not have the authority to offer her the cleaning work.

Instead, Minto lured her into a bedroom, before sexually assaulting the teenager and stabbing her in the head and neck with a kitchen knife 58 times.

He removed her partially clothed body from the hotel, before wrapping it in a carpet underlay, a black bin liner and bedding.

Minto, whose online name was David ‘Demon’ Minto, had first tried to claim that the blood on his clothes was due to a nose bleed.

Katie said after the trial, police told the family Minto had received a decent sentence and advised them to keep their heads down in case he appealed. 

‘Not once were we told that we could appeal and we were not told that we only had 28 days to appeal,’ she said.

She says that even if they had known, it’s not something her family would have been able to face. 

‘You have to sit in court and listen to pathologists talk about each individual injury, how deep it went into her body and what damage it caused.

‘After hearing all of that, how on earth do you then go and find out whether that sentence is appropriate? That is the last thing you are thinking about.

‘And then you are just supposed to accept a sentence that is unjust.’

What has made this knowledge harder to swallow for the family is that, just last year, they learned the Crown Prosecution Service had referred Minto’s case to the attorney general after the trial under the unduly lenient sentence scheme.

However his sentence was never referred to the court of appeal for a decision and it is now too late for his jail time to ever be reviewed.

Katie believes the attorney general’s office simply ran out of time because of the 28 day limit.

She said: ‘I was absolutely devastated that there is nothing I can do, and I was absolutely furious; why were we not told that the CPS referred the case?’ 

Katie launched her ‘Sasha’s law’ new petition on October 31, which currently has more than 7,000 signatures, months after her previous petition was closed early due to the general election.

Her family also ran a petition in July 2023 to reform the process, which received close to 15,000 signatures.

The previous government rejected Sasha’s law, stating: ‘The government currently has no plans to remove the ULS scheme’s time limit.

‘Victims and families are informed about the limit by the CPS, and we are working to improve their awareness of the scheme.’

Katie wants to persuade the new government to listen to her story, but does ‘not have much faith’ that they will accept her calls for change.

She hopes that the petition will reach 100,000 signatures so that it can be debated in parliament.

That opportunity, she hopes, will allow her to stand up for families or murder victims, who are too often overlooked by those who think it will never affect them.

‘There is so much on TV and in the media, so many documentaries that dramatise it.The world is desensitised to murder. They forget that there is a real person there and a family behind it all.

‘It is not reacted to with the horror that it should be. People are just so dismissive of it now.

‘But no one knows if their mum or sister will go out and never come home.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: ‘We know that the aftermath of a trial can be distressing and exhausting for victims and their loved ones, which is why anyone can apply to the Unduly Lenient Sentence Scheme – taking the burden off victims themselves.’

Metro contacted the Crown Prosecution Service for comment.

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