Bulger killer's family 'in hiding after attack'

The family of one of James Bulger's killers has been forced into hiding after an alleged revenge attack, it is claimed.

Robert Thompson's mother Ann says the attack four days ago has made the family go into hiding for the ninth time in eight years.

A letter from her solicitor, approved by Mrs Thompson, reveals how she was attacked and threatened this week, triggering fears for the safety of her younger children.

The letter comes only days after James Bulger's mother Denise Fergus said she did not want vigilantes to take the lives of his killers.

She said she was frightened of an innocent person being mistaken for Thompson and fellow killer Jon Venables.

Home Secretary David Blunkett announced last month that Thompson and Venables were to be released with new identities after serving eight years for the killing in 1993.

A series of death threats against them have since been posted on an internet site.

Strict guidelines restricting media coverage of the duo, now aged 18, have been imposed by the High Court to protect them from revenge attacks.

The teenagers were 10 when they abducted two-year-old James from the Strand shopping precinct in Bootle, Merseyside, in February, 1993, before torturing him and battering him to death on a railway line.

The letter from Mrs Thompson's solicitor claims she is living "effectively in hiding, unable to live anything like a normal life because of the constant and real fear of revenge attacks".

It says she recognises that Robert committed "a terrible crime", but adds that her innocent younger children are being denied a proper education because they keep having to abandon their homes and belongings to escape attacks.