Dhaka, May 14 -- A 68-year-old man who has spent 38 years in jail has had his murder conviction quashed at the court of appeal in what is thought to be the longest-running miscarriage of justice in British history.

Peter Sullivan was wrongly convicted in 1987 for the frenzied murder of a florist and part-time pub worker, Diane Sindall, 21, who was killed as she left work in Bebington, Merseyside.

It was alleged that in August 1986 Sullivan had spent the day drinking heavily after losing a darts match and went out armed with a crowbar before a chance encounter with Sindall.

Her florist van had broken down on her way home from a pub shift and she was walking to a petrol station when she was beaten to death and sexually assaulted. Her bod...