AN APPEAL by two men found guilty of a brutal double murder in a Risca taxi office may have failed - but the campaign to clear their names looks set to continue.
John Roden, 42, and Michael Attwooll, 64, who have spent 14 years in prison, claim they are the victims of a miscarriage of justice.
Their fight against their convictions for the murder of Gerald Stevens and Christine Rees was heard at the Court of Appeal in London last month.
Yesterday, Lord Justice Latham, sitting with Mr Justice Tugendhat and Mr Justice Blair, dismissed all their grounds of appeal and declared their convictions were "safe".
It was a bitter disappointment for Mr Roden's mum Mary who has led the campaign for his release for more than a decade.
But she vowed: "We are still going to fight on."
She said they had found out much more and were working on that. "I really believe we will get something. We have got to go on and on."
Her son, currently serving his sentence in a Leicester prison, was not at the hearing.
Denis Eady, of South Wales Against Wrongful Conviction, said they were "completely appalled" at the Court of Appeal's decision.
"As far as we are concerned this is not the end of the case. The campaign continues. We will be having discussions with the lawyers and various people to see where we go from here."
Attwooll and Roden claimed their trial was mishandled and the jury did not hear crucial evidence.
However, observing that the jury had "clearly believed" the prosecution's evidence against the pair, Lord Justice Latham, said: "We do not consider that anything we have heard undermines the safety of the verdict".
He later added the case provided a good example of the difficulty in looking into complaints made about the conduct of a trial, with the benefit of hindsight, many years after the event.
Roden's solicitor Glyn Maddocks said: "The Court of Appeal dismissed evidence it took the Civil Procedure Rule Committee 10 years to compile in just four hours."
Mr Maddocks said that new, significant points must be found before the case can go before the court of appeal again.
"We will mobilise a campaign group as they are rotting away in jail for something they didn't do. It was pretty clear to anyone in court that the evidence was swept under the carpet again."
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