A prominent lawyer of Indian-origin, Saimo Chahal, is mounting a legal challenge for the release of a jailed Yorkshire ripper on the ground that his human rights had been breached.

Peter Sutcliffe’s 61, was convicted of killing 13 women and attempting to kill seven more across Yorkshire and Manchester, between 1975 and 1980. He was sentenced to 20 life sentences in 1981 and was told by the judge that he would serve a minimum of 30 years.

However, Punjab-born Chahal, specialising in cases of civil liberties and social welfare, has claimed that Sutcliffe’s tariff, or the minimum term that a convict has to serve before being considered for release, was never formalised.

She is basing the case for Sutcliffe’s release on the ground that the Home Office disregarded his human rights, in failing to fix a tariff for his sentence.

Sutcliffe, who mostly targetted sex workers and killed them before mutilating their bodies, was diagnosed with schizophrenia after spending three years in prison and was transferred to a hospital. An award winning lawyer, Chahal aims to get Sutcliffe back into the prison system and has requested a reassessment of the psychiatric condition of the ‘Yorkshire Ripper’. Chahal was named Legal Aid Lawyer of the Year in a 2006 poll for “repeatedly pushing the boundaries of the law on behalf of those with mental illness”.