ROW OVER TAGGED THUG WHO KICKED VICTIM TO DEATH

David Hart, 21, was under four separate bail terms when he carried out the street attack on 39-year-old Christopher Rooney in Wishaw, Lanarkshire, in April 2008.

Mr Rooney suffered a total of 79 injuries in the fatal assault carried out by Hart and his brother Ryan, 19, who was ruled insane and sent to the State Hospital at Carstairs.

Outraged opposition politicians last night blamed European human rights laws for allowing a presumption of bail in Scottish courts Tory justice spokesman Bill Aitken said: “We want prisoners in prison, not convicts in the community.

“For 10 years now, first with Labour and the Liberal Democrats, and now with the SNP, public safety has been treated as an inconvenience. We don’t deserve to live in this soft-touch Scotland.”

Earlier, sentencing Hart at the High Court in Edinburgh, temporary judge Rita Rae, QC, told the killer: “There was nothing in the evidence to suggest your victim did anything to provoke this attack or to attract the level of violence inflicted on him.”

The judge ordered Hart should serve a minimum 15 years .

Mr Rooney had gone to the brothers’ home in Wishaw, but was asked to leave before being attacked in the garden. He suffered a head haemorrhage after he was repeatedly punched, kicked, stamped and jumped on.

As Mr Rooney lay dying, Hart watched Mr Bean on television and later slept in the house.

Hart had been granted bail three times at Hamilton Sheriff Court – the most recent five days before the murder. He was also freed on a bail order the same day at Motherwell District Court.