CRAZED knife murderer David Hamilton has been given the go-ahead to marry his former prison art teacher.

The killer slashed 39-year-old mother-of-three Sharon Metcalfe 65 times at her home in Coundon, County Durham, in 1997.

The Northern Echo revealed last month that 20-year-old Hamilton, also of Coundon, planned to marry mother-of-two Karen Garner, who is 11 years his senior.

Prison officials tried unsuccessfully to persuade the killer not to go ahead with the wedding until after his release from Moorland Young Offenders' Institution, near Doncaster.

Moorland governor Barry McCourt has now granted permission for the marriage to go ahead in the institution's chapel.

A Prison Service spokesperson said: "The prison will facilitate the marriage but no date has been set as yet."

Mr McCourt is bound by law to allow such an arrangement to take place.

But there will be none of the trappings of a normal wedding.

Hamilton and Garner will exchange vows in the prison chapel watched only by guards, the chaplain and a few close relatives and friends. No inmates will be at the ceremony.

It is understood that no hymns or organ music will be played, the newly-weds will share a one-hour visit after the vows before being separated. They will not be allowed to consummate the marriage.

There are no rules on what the couple wear for the wedding.

The news angered his victim's family.

Mrs Metcalfe's sister, Judith Thompson, from Shildon, County Durham, described the arrangement as "disgusting".

"How she can marry a murderer?" she asked.

Sharon Metcalfe's family fear the marriage may help secure Hamilton an early ticket out of prison.

Mrs Thompson, speaking on behalf of the family, said: "Will Hamilton get an early release date before the parole board?

"We are disgusted at monster Hamilton being allowed to build a new life,.

"His life should have been taken from him like Sharon's was taken from her."

Ms Metcalfe's brutal death rocked the Coundon community three years ago.

The mother had extended a hand of friendship to Hamilton. He repaid her by launching a ferocious attack on her while he was high on a cocktail of drugs and alcohol.

He is serving an indefinite life sentence for the killing, which long-serving police officers described as the most horrific they had ever seen.

Hamilton met Garner at Castington Young Offenders' Institution, near Morpeth, Northumberland, where the college art teacher had a part-time job teaching inmates