A SADIST who killed a 20-year-old call girl on Valentine's Day has been freed - as the victim's family say they "dread to think about anyone who meets him". Jeffrey Gafoor, 59, was released from prison last week after serving 21 years for the murder of Lynette White. The security guard stabbed sex worker Lynette more than 50 times and slit her throat during a frenzied sexual attack at her flat in Cardiff on Valentine’s Day 1988.

In one of the biggest miscarriages in British legal history, five men were wrongly jailed over her death - while Gafoor was able to live freely for 15 years. He was finally convicted in 2003 after advances in DNA technology. But despite being handed a life sentence, he has now walked free, the Ministry of Justice has confirmed. Lynette’s close family told The Sun: “We’ve had this over our heads for 36 years now. To think he was walking free for 15 years after killing Lynette.

“He’s now out again and living his life. “I dread to think about anyone who comes into contact with him. I just hope no one bumps into him. “He is excluded from a county in the south of England to protect our family but we don’t know where he could be going and that worries us. “I know the world has changed but it beggars belief that he is allowed to walk the streets. “Why the hell would you let him out. He should’ve got a full life sentence.”.

The altercation at Lynette's home in Butetown, Cardiff started with a row over £30. Five black and mixed race men, nicknamed the Cardiff Five, were subsequently arrested and jailed for her killing. Their convictions were quashed amid grave concerns about the conduct of the South Wales Police officers who investigated the case. Confirming that Gafoor had been released, a Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “Our thoughts are with the family and friends of Lynette White as they come to terms with this difficult news.

“Jeffrey Gafoor will be on licence for the rest of his life, with strict conditions and intensive probation supervision after he is released, and he faces an immediate return to prison if he breaks the rules.”. Gafoor was held in open prison from 2020 - and granted day released in January 2023. He was then given parole following a hearing in October, which members of the family, and previously accused John Actie - who wrongly spent time on remand for the murder - said they were unable to attend.

Mr Actie said: “We're always in a constant state of depression because it hangs over you on a daily basis. It's something you never forget, going through that.". Actie was charged with the murder after he was incriminated by Lynette's boyfriend and pimp Stephen Miller. Miller had himself been coerced into falsely confessing to the killing after a relentless 13-hour police interview, where detectives intimidated and threatened him.

Despite being aged 26 at the time, he had the mental age of an 11-year-old. Miller's admission of guilt also incriminated three other non-white men - Ronnie Actie (John's cousin), Tony Paris and Yusef ‘Dullah’ Abdullahi. This was despite a white man having been seen by four witnesses, stressed and in tears, his hands bleeding, outside the building in Tiger Bay in Cardiff's docklands. Police had even produced a photofit on the Crimewatch programme of a white man with greasy dark brown hair they were looking for.

John Actie, a distant acquaintance of Stephen Miller's later said he knew police were "fitting me up" after his first interview. He said : “They were putting me with a group of other guys who I knew from the area but didn’t go around with. It didn’t make any sense. "We didn’t bother with each other. One of them was my cousin, but even we weren’t close.". In 2021, Actie returned to the court in which he was falsely imprisoned for the first time in 30 years.

Walking around Swansea Guildhall Crown Court, he recalled: "You're very scared because obviously you don't want a life sentence. "I've walked up these stairs a million times in my mind. I had to hold the rail because I didn't know whether I was going to collapse or not. "It affected many people and still affects us now.". Actie was acquitted by a jury after spending two years in custody and received £300,000 in compensation.