Overview

• On July 28, 2025, Judge Robert Altham at Preston Crown Court imposed a mandatory life term on Thomas Dures, who must serve at least 23 years before parole eligibility.
• After fatally stabbing 19-year-old Matthew Daulby on July 29, 2023, Dures discarded his knife and clothing, fled through the Channel Tunnel and remained on the run across Europe for 18 months before surrendering in Athens in December 2024.
• In March 2024, Henry Houghton received a life sentence with a 20-year minimum term for his part in the same Ormskirk street brawl, during which he struck Daulby over the head with a rock-filled sock.
• CCTV footage showing both attackers advancing on the group and a post-mortem confirming a single fatal chest wound were pivotal in securing convictions in consecutive trials.
• Police credited sustained public appeals and media coverage with maintaining pressure on investigators and facilitating Dures’s extradition from Greece in January 2025.