Scottish judges block killer Luke Mitchell's bid to take appeal to Supreme Court

22-year-old Mitchell (above) was ordered to serve at least 20 years in 2005 for the "truly evil" murder of his 14-year-old girlfriend Jodi Jones in Dalkeith, Midlothian.

He has sought permission from senior judges in Scotland to take his appeal to the Supreme Court.

However, Scotland's top judge, sitting with two other judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh, ruled that leave to go to the London court should be refused.

Mitchell, who argues that aspects of his trial were unfair and breached his human rights, is now expected to appeal directly to the Supreme Court to hear his case.

Jodi's mother Judith and several other family members were in court for today's hearing, as they have been during every stage of the legal proceedings involving Mitchell.

Mitchell's mother Corinne was also present in court. She later vowed that "the fight will go on".

After the hearing, she stood next to spokeswoman Sandra Lean, who told reporters: "Luke did not kill Jodi. The person who did knows who he is, as do the people who shielded him all these years.

"This fight will go on until that person is where he deserves to be. Until he is, none of our daughters are safe."

Asked whether they would be going directly to the Supreme Court, she replied: "We will be."

Jodi was stripped, tied up and stabbed to death, and her mutilated body was dumped in woods near her home in June 2003.

Mitchell, who was 14 at the time of the murder, has always protested his innocence but his appeal against conviction was rejected in 2008.

His subsequent attempts to have additional grounds of appeal heard by judges in Scotland have been refused and his attempt to have his minimum jail term cut also failed.

Today, he returned to the Appeal Court in Edinburgh seeking permission to take his case to the highest court in the UK. In some circumstances the Supreme Court can hear appeals in Scottish criminal cases which centre on human rights grounds.

Defence QC Maggie Scott argued that the London court should hear three relevant issues, known as "devolution issues". These centre on the way police interviewed Mitchell and on the Crown's use of identification evidence during his high-profile trial at the High Court in Edinburgh.

In paperwork lodged with the court, Mitchell's legal team argued that the Lord Advocate relied upon evidence identifying Mitchell which was "unfairly obtained and had the effect of rendering his trial unfair and in breach of the accused's rights".

They further argued that his interview with police, carried out when he was 15, was conducted in a way which was "oppressive and constituted an interrogation designed to break the accused and obtain an admission".

They also argued what was described in court as a "Cadder point", namely that Mitchell was interviewed as a suspect but was not given access to legal advice before being quizzed.

The Supreme Court issued a ruling last year, which has become known as the Cadder decision, ruling that the Scottish system which allowed suspects to be held and questioned for six hours without access to a lawyer breached the European Convention on Human Rights.

Crown representative Gillian Wade QC argued today that leave to go to London should be refused, saying the matters had not been raised at an earlier stage in Mitchell's appeal proceedings.

The Lord Justice General Lord Hamilton, sitting with Lords Osborne and Eassie, ultimately rejected Mitchell's arguments.

He said: "The court is of the view that this is not an appropriate case for which it could grant leave to appeal to the Supreme Court. The appeal is accordingly refused."

Elgin businessman Nat Fraser, convicted in 2003 of murdering his estranged wife Arlene in 1998, recently won an appeal at the Supreme Court when judges ruled his conviction was unsafe. They sent the case back to Edinburgh to be quashed.

It has led to a political storm over the role of the London court in Scottish criminal law.