IAN Simms serving life for the murder of Billinge insurance worker Helen McCourt is being allowed to challenge a decision by the Home Secretary Michael Howard which halted prison visits by a journalist campaigning for his release.

Simms (39) was the landlord of the George and Dragon pub at Billinge, when he was convicted in 1989 of murdering Helen. Her body has never been recovered and Simms insists he cannot say where it is because he did not kill her.

In 1991, investigative journalist Bob Woffinden, who specialises in miscarriages of justice, began visiting Simms in prison. But in 1994, John Evans, MP for St Helens North where the murder victim's mother Marie lives, complained about the visits.

The then prison service boss Derek Lewis, replied that there had been prison visits in the past, but that no more would be allowed unless Mr Woffinden produced a written undertaking that no material obtained from Simms would be used for "professional purposes, in particular, for publication". Mr Woffinden refused and his visits to Simms ceased in 1994.

This week lawyers for Simms told Mr Justice Collins that the Home Office policy of requiring "no publicity" undertakings from journalists affected other similar cases and amounted to an unlawful blanket ban.

The judge gave leave for a judicial review, expected to take place in October.

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