A CAR thief who ran over and killed a woman police constable on duty was jailed for eight years yesterday.

Thomas Whaley, 19, of Oldham, Greater Manchester, denied murdering 29-year-old PC Alison Armitage - originally from North Yorkshire - but admitted the lesser charge of manslaughter.

PC Armitage died after being run over twice by the stolen car in the car park of a derelict pub in Oldham, in March.

Sentencing Whaley at Manchester Crown Court, Mr Justice Hunt told him he had taken the life of a "brave, conscientious and plainly absolutely outstanding officer".

Earlier, the court heard how PC Armitage had been working undercover with a colleague investigating the theft of a car.

Her colleague, PC Gary Lamont, heard Whaley return and start the engine. Immediately, he ran to the car, shouting at Whaley to get out.

Henry Globe, prosecuting, told the court: "Constable Lamont remembers hearing a thud, then Armitage screaming at him from the rear of the Vectra.

"He saw her being sucked under the moving car as the Vectra reversed over her.

"She disappeared from view and was dragged further up the road by the car."

When the car came to a stop, Whaley got out of the vehicle and was arrested, only to run away as PC Lamont returned to tend to his dying colleague. Whaley was chased by a member of the public and later arrested.

Yesterday, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter, one charge of the theft of the Vauxhall Vectra involved in PC Armitage's death, aggravated vehicle taking and driving while disqualified.

Paul Worsley, defending, told the court how not a day passed when Whaley had not thought of the tragedy he had caused.

But he said his client, knowing that he had effectively been caught red-handed, had panicked.

Colleagues of PC Armitage, who was only the fourth woman officer to die on duty in Britain, wept and hugged one another in the public gallery as Whaley was sentenced.

Outside court, PC Armitage's mother, Lilian, from Appleton-le-Street near Malton, North Yorkshire, where the officer was buried in March, said: "We have lost our lovely Alison, who loved the world, her family and the police force. She should still be here.

"We are totally devastated. Whatever sentence was passed today would never have been enough, but today we feel justice has been done.