THE man wrongly convicted of killing a young Hampshire woman has issued a heartfelt apology to her family for the pain and suffering his false confession put them through.

Speaking for the first time since it was revealed he could not have been Teresa De Simone’s murderer, Sean Hodgson said he is sorry for the anguish her parents have suffered by having to relive the horror of her death.

On the eve of his appearance before the Court of Appeal tomorrow, he told of how he was “very excited” about the prospect of tasting freedom for the first time in nearly three decades.

And Hodgson, 58, said he now hopes police will reinvestigate the horrifying murder of the 22-year-old gas board accounts clerk in December 1979, and find whoever did kill her.

Yesterday, during his last full day inside Albany Prison on the Isle of Wight, where he has served 15 of his 27 years in jail, Hodgson met with his defence team for an hour and a half.

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The Daily Echo accompanied his solicitor Julian Young and business partner Judy Ramjeet as they travelled to the Island to see him there for the last time, making final arrangements before tomorrow’s Court of Appeal hearing which should see him cleared of murder.

Talking through his legal team, Hodgson spoke of how his mental state at the time made him falsely admit the brutal killing and how sorry he was for putting Miss De Simone’s family through that hardship.

Dressed in jeans, sweatshirt and a padded sleeveless jacket, Hodgson and his two legal representatives sat around a table and chatted about what should happen during tomorrow’s hearing.

With the Crown Prosecution Service saying it will not oppose the application to have his conviction declared unsafe, they also discussed what will happen after he is released.

Mr Young said despite his innocence, Hodgson, who appeared “frail and gaunt,”

also talked of his sorrow for the pain the re-examination of the case has caused Teresa’s mother and stepfather, Mary and Michael Sedotti.

“He is upset because the family have had to go through the trauma of what happened again,” Mr Young told the Daily Echo.

“He hopes the police will catch the person who is responsible, if that person is still alive after all this time, but he told me specifically to say he hopes that everybody understands that he was mentally ill at the time he made the admissions to the police.