Road rage killer Tracie Andrews seen 30 years after murder that shocked the nation

Clutching a Waitrose bag for life, she looks like any other shopper grabbing some essentials - but the middle-aged blonde on a grocery run is none other than road rage killer Tracie Andrews .

It is 30 years since an extraordinary press conference in which Andrews, 57, shed crocodile tears - appealing for information about her partner's killer when it was she who had knifed him no fewer than 42 times. She remains one of the most notorious killers in recent history - partly because of that televised attempt to cover up her heinous crime.

Andrews' crimes were thrust back into the spotlight after plans for a TV drama recreated the events of 1996, which was then postponed . She was back behind the wheel running errands when the Mirror tracked her down in the south west coastal town she now calls home.

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She has a new name and a new life after being convicted of murdering her fiancé, Lee Harvey. Andrews stabbed him 42 times with a penknife before blaming a 'fat man with staring eyes' who had pursued their vehicle. She hid the murder weapon in her boot and disposed of it in a hospital. It was all part of her elaborate cover up.

She told police that a 'road rage' killer had inflicted the injuries she sustained while attacking Lee, including a black eye. The former barmaid and budding model has returned to her blonde look after dyeing her hair brunette before her 2011 prison release. She was spotted at a McDonald's drive-thru and visiting a Post Office. She initially claimed Lee had been attacked by a man in a Ford Sierra.

Her account said the man killed Lee after a car chase, which began when he overtook their vehicle. Seven months earlier, Kenny Noye's murder of electrician Stephen Cameron on the M25 had placed 'road rage' in the national spotlight. It was a press conference at Redditch police station in Worcestershire where her alibi fell apart, and made the case so notorious. She made an emotional appeal for the murderer to be caught.

She wept as she claimed that another car had chased her and Mr Harvey for five miles after the couple left a pub in Bromsgrove. Five days later, police charged her with Lee's murder. Former Mirror man Rod Chaytor, 77 and now retired, was among the reporters covering the murder back in December 1996. Rod asked the first 'killer question' at the news conference and realised Andrews had changed her account almost immediately.

"I asked a question based on the police timings," he said. "I thought that I had got it wrong and I thought, 'Oh my God' I had made a mistake. But I hadn't, and I glanced up and saw the police officer in charge of the case, Ian Johnson, look across at Tracie.

"I then realised that she was changing her story. Road rage was still a comparatively new phenomenon back then.