A wealthy jeweller's son who murdered his 17-year-old girlfriend in a jealous rage has been jailed for at least 16 years.

Elliot Turner, 20, part of a gang of rich young men who called themselves The Firm, strangled Emily Longley in his bed after becoming suspicious that she was seeing other men and wanted to end their relationship.

Jailing Turner for life, Mrs Justice Dobbs said: "Emily was a lovely, kind, fun-loving girl who brought a ray of sunshine to those she touched. That light has been extinguished suddenly and needlessly by you."

Winchester crown court heard that Turner had branded Emily a "whore" on the night he killed her. She threw a drink over him and back at his home in Bournemouth, Dorset, he smothered her with a pillow and strangled her.

Dobbs continued: "You told your parents you loved Emily ? you really do not know the meaning of love. Loving someone is not telling them they are a whore, it is not trying to control them, it is not threatening them, it is not slagging them off to your friends. You did not love her, she was just a trophy.

"The relationship, if it can be called that, was all about you. It was about control: control you carried out using aggression and threats.

"In my judgment it's apparent you had been thinking of killing Emily and it was only a matter of time before it happened because it's clear she wanted to be free from you and you would not let that happen ? if you could not have her no-one else would do. You can put away thoughts of champagne, Bentleys and girls and concentrate on the reason you are serving a life sentence."

Emily's family sat in the well of the court to hear the judge. Speaking outside the court, her father, Mark Longley, said he was satisfied with the outcome. "We are pleased he is not on the streets now. He's an incredibly dangerous person and we are relieved he cannot do this again."