ANGER and disgust has enveloped Worcester and old painful wounds reopened as word spread that triple child murderer David McGreavy could be released.

The killer of three young children in April 1973 has been let out of jail unsupervised for regular jaunts in Liverpool preparing him for his release from prison, as revealed in yesterday's Worcester News.

The brutal impaling on garden railings of Paul Ralph, aged four, and his sisters Dawn Maria, two, and Samantha Jane, nine months, after they had each been killed shocked a nation.

In Gillam Street and the rest of the Rainbow Hill area of Worcester yesterday, the news that McGreavy would be released was greeted with disdain. For some in that close-knit community, time has done nothing to lessen the shock.

On the night of Friday, April 12, 1973, McGreavy, who was a lodger at the children's family's home, had been drinking in the Vauxhall Inn, which still stands on Astwood Road.

As the regulars read about McGreavy's release in the Worcester News yesterday, landlady Maxine Green summed up the views of many.

She said: "It's disgusting. Three young lives brutally cut short. That should mean three life sentences."

Mrs Green remembered how, when she was 16, the killings shook Worcester to its core.

"It was so horrific because the victims were so young," she said.

"He's been in prison, protected at the taxpayers' expense and now he's got money to go out shopping, listen to a personal stereo and do things that we struggle to pay for after a full day's work."

At the New Chequers Inn, further down Astwood Road, three men who lived nearby at the time of killings, said many people were upset to hear of the murderer's impending release.

Barry Obrey said: "I knew the family (of McGreavy) personally. It destroyed their lives.

"He's better off in jail. I can remember the news of the murders like it was yesterday. How can you forget something like that?

"My mum and dad had just split up and my dad had moved into Gillam Street, just a few doors down. When I'd heard what had happened in the morning it frightened me to think what had gone on down there. I ran up there to find my dad but the police had cordoned it all off.

"It just won't go away. It's very upsetting and very emotional."

Dave Richardson added: "My mother worked with his (McGreavy's) mother and you couldn't meet a nicer woman.

"Feelings run very high around here, even after all this time.

"I think the house in Gillam Street, where it happened, should have been knocked down the way Fred West's was. The old neighbours still talk about it. There've been quite a few murders in Worcester over the years but this was the worst and the pain doesn't go away."

Ivor Auty was equally angry. He said: "You never forget something like this. I was in the marines at the time and everybody was talking about it. It sickened everybody: the local bobby, the father of the children, McGreavy's family. It destroyed so many lives. It's just sick that he should be out and about now. He has his life but what about those three young children?

"This brings it all back. We can never forget."

Paul's throat had been cut, Dawn had been strangled, and Samantha had head injuries.

McGreavy was sentenced to life imprisonment.

The Home Office said that it was normal for prisoners serving life sentences to be allowed out temporarily before their release.