A woman who murdered her newborn baby in 2017 by stabbing her more than 15 times has died in prison, six years into her 17-year sentence.
Rachel Tunstill, 28, passed away on Monday, according to a statement from the HM Prison Service. Tunstill was convicted of the murder of her baby daughter, Mia Kelly, who she killed in the bathroom of their Burnley home.
Tunstill initially received a life sentence with a minimum term of 20 years. However, her legal team argued she should have been convicted of the lesser charge of infanticide, which led to a re-trial. In 2019, Tunstill was convicted of murder once again and sentenced to 17 years in prison.
On August 1, 2025, Tunstill died in custody at HMP Styal. A spokesperson for the Prison Service confirmed her death, stating that the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will investigate, as is standard with all deaths in custody.
In 2017, Tunstill gave birth to Mia secretly while her boyfriend was playing video games. Afterward, she stabbed the baby to death with a pair of scissors and disposed of her body in a bin, wrapped in plastic bags. She falsely told her boyfriend that she had miscarried.
The horrific crime shocked the local community, and police described it as “callous and brutal.” Tunstill was arrested after going to the hospital for a check-up, where she was found still carrying the baby’s umbilical cord and placenta.
At her 2017 trial, Judge Mr. Justice Davis noted there was “no way of knowing” why Tunstill committed the crime. Upon sentencing her in 2019, Judge Mr. Justice King stated: “This must have been a sustained and frenzied attack on a victim who, because of her age, was particularly vulnerable. Her duty to her newborn baby was to cradle and comfort her—not to stab her to death.”
Related topics:
