Ruth Ellis, last woman executed in UK, granted posthumous conditional pardon

Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be executed in the United Kingdom, has been granted a posthumous conditional pardon, more than 70 years after she was hanged at London's Holloway Prison in 1955.

Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be executed in the United Kingdom, has been granted a posthumous conditional pardon, more than 70 years after she was hanged at London’s Holloway Prison in 1955. Ellis, a 28-year-old mother of two, was convicted of murdering her lover David Blakely after a tumultuous relationship marked by physical and emotional abuse. Her case provoked a public outcry and occurred just two years before legal changes introduced diminished responsibility as a defence.

In the House of Commons on Wednesday, Labour MP Pam Cox asked Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner for the pardon on behalf of Ellis’s grandchildren, who were watching from the public gallery. Rayner responded: “I have the honour to say that His Majesty the King has accepted our advice to grant Ruth Ellis a conditional pardon. While the pardon does not claim she was innocent of killing David Blakely, it replaces the death penalty with a sentence of life imprisonment to recognise a profound injustice in this exceptional case.”

Ellis’s family have campaigned for decades to have her murder conviction overturned, arguing that the domestic abuse she suffered should have been taken into account. During her trial, the judge instructed the jury to disregard the fact that she had been “badly treated by her lover” as a defence. Her story was turned into the 1985 film Dance with a Stranger, starring Miranda Richardson and Rupert Everett.

Katy Colton, a partner at law firm Mishcon de Reya who acted for Ellis’s grandchildren, called the pardon “a landmark moment.” She said “Today’s decision does not only right a wrong done over 70 years ago. It sends a clear signal about the aspirations of our justice system. Violence against women and girls remains a national emergency. The government’s public acknowledgement that the abuse Ruth Ellis endured should have impacted the outcome of her case reflects an important principle: that survivors of domestic abuse today deserve a justice system that properly understands and recognises the impact of that abuse.”

The death penalty was abolished as the punishment for murder in 1965, with the last executions taking place in 1964 when two men were hanged for murder. Ellis’s pardon is seen as a significant step in recognising the failures of the justice system in her case and its broader implications for how domestic abuse is treated in criminal proceedings.