A TEENAGE killer who battered a student to death on a pier will serve at least nine years behind bars, a judge ruled yesterday.

A month after Kevin Littlewood 18, was convicted of murdering John Paul Jeffries on Skeleton Pier, near Hartlepool Marina, he was brought back from jail to hear his fate under new legislation.

Littlewood, who was 17 at the time of the crime, had been ordered to be detained at Her Majesty's Pleasure after his Teesside Crown Court trial before Judge Peter Fox.

The judge told him yesterday that he could only expect to be considered for parole after serving nine years.

Littlewood, who denied murder in January last year, claimed he watched an older man batter 18-year-old Mr Jeffries with a rock before stuffing his body between rocks at low tide. It was found six days later by fishermen.

Littlewood, of St Paul's Road, Hartlepool, claimed that the killing of the Hartlepool College of Further Education student was a spur of the moment act.

But Judge Fox described the claim as "poppycock", adding: "It is such a fantastic story that I can't possibly accept it."

Ian Hudson, defending, said that a psychiatrist had described Littlewood as an "extremely vulnerable young man", who was only 17 at the time of killing of Jeffries, of Lowthian Road, Hartlepool.

He had no previous convictions but he had taken three overdoses, the last just hours after the tragedy.