The murder conviction of a former church warden for killing a university lecturer following a campaign of physical and mental torture is to be referred to the Court of Appeal .

Benjamin Field, of Olney, Buckinghamshire, was ordered to serve at least 36 years behind bars in October 2019 after being convicted of the murder of Peter Farquhar following a trial at Oxford Crown Court.

The 34-year-old was jailed after the jury accepted that he had driven the pensioner to think he was losing his mind in order to inherit his house and money.

The prosecution case at trial was that Field secretly gave Mr Farquhar tranquiliser drugs and spiked his whisky, hoping that his eventual death would look like suicide or an accident.

On Tuesday, legal review body the Criminal Cases Review Commission

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