THE parents of a woman killed by her boyfriend have called for stiffer sentences for teenagers after he was locked up for less than three years.

Billy Clifton, 20, walked free from a young offenders' institution at the end of last month, after serving two years and nine months of a four-year sentence.

Clifton, from Darlington, strangled his 20-year-old girlfriend, Rachael Littlefair, the mother of his daughter, Caitlin, in August 2001.

Rachael's parents, Don and Lynn, said they would have appealed over the "leniency" of the sentence - but because Clifton was under 21, the maximum term he could have received was five years.

Clifton was 18 when he killed Rachael.

"I'm very bitter and angry," said Mr Littlefair.

"You're allowed to vote at 18, you can drink at 18, but in the judicial system you're classed as a young offender until you're 21 - and we can't understand why."

Mrs Littlefair said: "We have a life sentence, because there isn't a day that goes by when we don't think or talk about Rachael.

"Don still goes to the cemetery every day. We will be victims the rest of our lives.

"And Rachael can't have a second chance, but Billy can, it's not right."

She described how she felt sick at the thought of bumping into her daughter's killer should he decide to return to Darlington.

She said: "I can't sleep at the moment because of all this. He's out on licence until September, but after that he could come back here."

In court, it was said that Clifton had felt trapped in a destructive relationship with Rachael and that his temper finally exploded at their Lanethorpe Crescent home.

He strangled Rachael before going to Darlington police station, where he told detectives: "I just lost it. I just felt like I needed to kill her. I had had enough."

Although he was originally charged with murder, prosecutors accepted a guilty plea to the lesser charge of manslaughter, and he was sentenced to four years in a young offenders' institution at Teesside Crown Court in February 2002.

Mr and Mrs Littlefair are the legal guardians of Caitlin, now aged three, who they say has helped them come to terms with their loss. But they dread the day they must explain to her what happened to her mother.

Mr Littlefair said: "Caitlin knows where her mum is, that she's at the cemetery.

"She's at nursery now and is a happy little girl. It's hard, when do you tell her what happened?"

Mrs Littlefair said: "Caitlin said to me one day 'When is my mummy coming back alive?' and I said 'She can't'. And she said to me 'But she might.' That really hurt."

Her husband said: "Although the pain will never go away for us, we can't go around moping all the time.

"The hurt is always there, all the time, and we miss Rachael every day."

The Littlefairs' other daughter, Kirsty, 20, has a daughter, Mia, who is 14 months old.

Mr Littlefair said: "It's helped having Caitlin, Kirsty and Mia, it really has.

"Without all of them I don't know how we would have got by."