For more than a decade Farnley roofer James Hopkins got away with the vicious murder of a transsexual prostitute.

But for a revolutionary computer programme which finally identified the palm prints he had left in his victim's blood and in the murder flat in London, Hopkins would be free today.

* Click here to sign up to free news and sport email alerts from Wortley Today.

Now the man who carried out the grizzly killing faces a life sentence after he was found guilty of murder following a two week trial at the Old Bailey. He will be sentenced tomorrow.

After the killing on February 28 1997 Hopkins returned to West Yorkshire.

* Click here to make Wortley Today your friend on Facebook.

He lived with his partner Donna Abbott and her children on Bawn Drive while his ex-wife resided a few streets away with her children.

He appeared to be an ordinary, hard working man employed as a roofer by A Baldwin and Co (Builders) Ltd, Melbourne Street, Morley, Leeds.
Though originally from Glasgow it is believed he had lived most of his life in West Yorkshire.

He was viewed by neighbours and friends as a strong family man, who enjoyed an occasional drink with his partner at the local pub and the odd flutter on the horses.

But behind this facade he hid his dreadful secret – he had brutally ended the life of 23-year-old transsexual prostitute Robyn Browne in a London bedsit.

Robyn was born James Darwin Browne, at Prince Risborough. Her parents were devout Jehovah's Witnesses.

Robyn frequented the clubs and bars of the Soho scene and eventually teamed-up with another pre-operative transsexual Natasha Brentwood he met in 1995.

They shared a home together in the five-storey town house in Gosfield Street renting a one-bedroom flat.

Robyn worked as a prostitute with the Transworld Agency based in central London.

On the day Robyn was murdered, Natasha had been out for a meal with her boyfriend. When she returned, the front door was looked.
She climbed through the window and discovered Robyn dressed in bra and pants and covered in blood lying on the bed.

She had suffered nine stab wounds, including one to the heart, three times to the neck which cut through the carotid artery, and others to the torso.

Natasha dragged the body onto the bedroom floor and dialled 999.
Uniform officers and detectives from Marylebone Division were the first police to be called in before a murder inquiry was launched by the Central London Murder Team headed by Det Supt Bryan Morris.

A full forensic and scenes of crime investigation was launched and a Murder Incident Room set-up.

There was no sign of a break-in at the flat, though a drawer had been pulled out and pages torn from Robyn's personal organiser.

DNA evidence and fingerprints were recovered from the murder scene.
The most crucial evidence was a palm print found in Robyn's blood on the frame of the door to the bedroom together with matching palm prints found on copies of the Sun newspaper and an advertising paper, both dated the day of the murder – February 28 1997.

Back in 1997 there were masses of prints taken from criminals and suspects stored on police records, but there was no computer programme capable of searching them to find a match.

Without a name of a possible new suspect to call up any palm print stored against their record to check for a match, the incriminating palm prints from the murder flat could be of no assistance.

The Murder Incident Room was mothballed after a year.

Over subsequent years further reviews of the case were undertaken but the final break-through in identifying Hopkins came when during another review a new DNA hit from the address was isolated.

The palm prints turned out to belong to James Hopkins. His palm prints are believed to have been on record with the National Fingerprint Collection following minor previous convictions.

Detailed examination confirmed that the palm print from the door and those on the two newspapers matched – they all belonged to Hopkins.
Detectives established that Hopkins was in the south of England at the time of the killing.

Officers travelled north to Leeds and arrested him at his home in Farnley.

When he was interviewed by detectives after his arrest on June 27 2007 , Hopkins proved uncooperative.

Det Insp Steve Smith said: "This was a fantastic result and development of forensics.

"I hope Hopkins' conviction provides James Browne's family with some sense of closure after all this time and such an horrific murder.

"Hopkins appeared to be Mr Average, but he was in fact yesteryear's killer."