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Evil killer Stephen McCullagh who was sent to prison for 31 years earlier this month for the murder of his pregnant partner, Natalie McNally, has lodged an appeal against his sentence.
McCullagh, 36, from Woodland Gardens in Lisburn, County Antrim, denied murdering Natalie in her Silverwood Green home in Lurgan on 18 December 2022, but was found guilty after a four week trial.
Natalie was 15 weeks pregnant when she was murdered – and the judge said she had been was subjected to a “brutal and frenzied attack”.
“The defendant did not just kill Natalie McNally, her unborn child also died as a result of the murderous assault,” said the judge.
He said that even setting the prison term at 31 years “cannot possibly reflect the value of Natalie’s life, or indeed that of her unborn child, Dean” or meet the McNally family’s sense of “grief and loss”.
Speaking outside the court after McCullagh was sentenced on June 2nd, Natalie’s family said they were “serving a life sentence” since the murder of their “beloved” daughter, but they hoped the sentence would serve “to deter and to help stop violence against women and girls in this country.”
McCullagh must serve a minimum of 31 years before he can be considered for release by parole commissioners – but now the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) has been notified that an appeal against the sentence has been lodged.
He has claimed to investigators that he could not have killed Natalie because at the time of her death he was live streaming on YouTube – but detectives later proved he had broadcast a pre-record as if it was live.
At the sentencing hearing, the court was reminded of the 48 separate “serious and extensive injuries” Natalie suffered, including stab wounds to her neck, blunt force trauma to her head, and compression injuries
McCullagh was accused of “callousness and wickedness”.
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