Kissel's new appeal bid blasted by her in-law

The father-in-law of milkshake murderer Nancy Kissel has denounced her latest attempt to seek an appeal.

'Is there never an end to her machinations?' asked Bill Kissel, the father of banker Robert Kissel, who was beaten to death in 2003.

In an interview yesterday with the South China Morning Post via e-mail, he said he understood that Kissel was considering basing her appeal on a claim that she was not properly represented by her British lawyer, Edward Fitzgerald QC. 'It is strange that after two trials, in which she was found guilty, she should still insist she was improperly represented.'

His comments came after the Post reported that Nancy Kissel had recently filed an application for leave to appeal 'out of time' against her second murder conviction handed down in March last year after a retrial.

Kissel fed her husband a drug-laced milkshake before bludgeoning him to death with a lead ornament at their Parkview complex in Tai Tam.

Chief Inspector Lawrence Ng Yeung-yin, who handled the case, said she had not yet put forward her grounds for an appeal.

Solicitor Colin Cohen, who represented Kissel during the retrial, did not respond to the Post's inquiries.

Bill Kissel said he had been very concerned Nancy Kissel would be transferred to the US to serve her life sentence. 'It is most important that she remain in Hong Kong and away from the US prison system, where she has the potential to interfere in her children's lives,' he said.

The Kissel children - Elaine, June and Reis - filed a lawsuit against their mother in 2006 over the wrongful death of their father. That same year, a US court awarded custody of the two girls and the boy to Jane Kissel Clayton, Robert Kissel's sister. Bill Kissel said the children were leading 'normal, happy lives' in the US.

In the original trial, Kissel pleaded not guilty to murder, saying she had acted in self-defence. But a retrial was ordered after the top court found the first trial had been flawed. In the retrial she pleaded guilty to manslaughter but denied the murder on the grounds of diminished responsibility and provocation.