A GRADUATE convicted of robbing a 94-year-old North-East woman while posing as a priest is launching a fresh bid to clear his name.

Steven Gray, who has always maintained his innocence, will ask for his conviction to be examined by the Criminal Cases Review Commission, the independent body set up to investigate suspected miscarriages of justice

Gray, 30, was found guilty and jailed for seven years at the end of a week-long trial at Newcastle Crown Court more than two-and-a-half years ago.

But campaigners claim the conviction was wrong and are helping him put together a case which they hope will go to the Court of Appeal.

Gray, from Tyneside, is being held in Wymott Prison, near Preston, Lancashire, but will be denied a transfer to a more lax jail because he refuses to admit his guilt.

He is also refusing to go on offender behaviour programmes and his stance means he will be denied the chance of parole when he becomes eligible for it next year.

His stepmother Jenny Gray said: "There is a lot of evidence which was available earlier which was not used and, although it will take time, we are hoping for a positive outcome."

Gray was convicted in January 2002 after the jury heard how Isabella Brown, a parishioner of Newcastle's Roman Catholic cathedral, allowed a man dressed in a cassock into her home.

The man then knocked her to the ground and stole £30.

Police found a cassock at Gray's home in Cruddas Park, Newcastle, but he insists he had owned it since he was 12 because he had been in the church choir and then became an alter server.

Before he was convicted, Gray, a Catholic convert, is said to have had ambitions to join the priesthood.

He trained to be a priest at St Anthony's, in Durham, in 1994.

Gray is now studying for a masters degree in psychology while behind bars and, according to his stepmother, is coping well with life in prison.

Mrs Gray said: "I never expected him to be able to survive this but he has got himself together. He is doing better than we are, actually.

"He has come to terms with the fact that he is in for a while but knows that we are working hard to help him all the time.

"He has his down days but, for the main part, he is getting on with it and putting his time to good use."

Phil Willis, MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, and John Grogan, MP for Selby, who represents Gray's divorced parents, have also expressed concern about the conviction.