Devon. February 4 February – Moors Murderer Myra Hindley is informed by Home Secretary Michael Howard that she will never be released from prison. Hindley, who has now been in prison for more than 30 years, was originally issued with a whole life tariff by the then Home Secretary David Waddington in 1990, but not informed of the ruling until just over two years ago. 6 February – The Court of Appeal rules that Mrs Diane Blood of Leeds can be inseminated with her dead husband's sperm. Mrs Blood had been challenging for the right to use the sperm of her husband Stephen since just after his death two years ago. 12 February – A 23 year old British soldier is shot dead in Northern Ireland. Lance Bombardier Stephen Restorick was shot by a sniper while manning a checkpoint in Bessbrook (County Armagh); he is the last British soldier to be killed by the Provisional IRA. 14 February – The Daily Mail newspaper accuses five young men of the murder of Stephen Lawrence on its front page the day after a coroner's inquest found that the teenager had been unlawfully killed in an unprovoked racist attack by five white youths in April 1993. 15 February - Murder of 13 year old Billie Jo Jenkins in Hastings, East Sussex who was beaten to death at the family home. Her stepfather Siôn Jenkins was convicted of her murder in 1998 but subsequently acquitted at a second retrial in 2006. 22 February – Scientists at the Roslin Institute announce the birth of a cloned sheep named Dolly seven months after the fact. 27 February – The government loses its Commons majority again after a Labour victory at the Wirral South by-election. March 10 March – 160 vehicles are involved in a motorway pile up on the M42 motorway at Bromsgrove, Worcestershire. Three people are killed and 60 injured. 17 March – John Major announces that the general election will be held on 1 May. Despite the opinion polls having shown a double-digit Labour lead continuously since late 1992, Major is hoping for a unique fifth successive term of Conservative government by pinning his hopes on a strong economy and low unemployment – no incoming government since before the First World War has inherited economic statistics as strong as the ones that Labour will should they win the election. 18 March – The Sun