• 2 hours ago
• Posted in:Assault/Wounding, Domestic violence, Murder/ Manslaughter, Possession of weapons, Violent Offences
• 0
• Author: Trans Crime
• Tags: 6ft plus, Aged 20-29, Aged 40-49, Alcohol, Cheshire, Cheshire Constabulary, Community note, Convicted 2007, Convicted 2026, Domestic abuse/violence, England, HMP Grendon, HMP Parkhurst, HMP Winchester, Indeterminate sentence, Law enforcement victim, Lied to police, Likely story, Male prison, Male victim, Media obscuring trans status, Multiple victims, Offended 2007, Offended 2025, Partner victim, Police /courts using defendant pronouns, Prison relationship, Prison transition, Repeat offender, Reported as woman, Trans woman

Aurin Makepeace, a violent male who identifies as a transgender woman, was convicted at Chester Crown Court in March 2026 of the murder of Steven Rothwell, aged 41 and the ex-partner of Makepeace.  Mr Rothwell’s family paid tribute to him as a “resilient and mischievous” man and that they would miss his “silly, dry, dark sense of humour”.

Mr Rothwell’s body (himself a convicted murderer) was found in the bathroom of his home in Macclesfield, Cheshire on August 19, 2025. He had suffered a stab wound to his chest. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) dismissed Makepeace’s various lies (that changed several times) saying that the victim was ‘accidentally hurt’ while they were ‘grappling’, saying this was ‘no accident,’ and Makepeace, after having ‘some thinking time,’ concocted an ‘implausible story that this was a horrible accident’.

Makepeace, who is aged 42 and 6ft tall, was arrested in his home town of Prestatyn during the afternoon of August 20, having spent the intervening period drinking vodka under a bush and making phonecalls to the police pretending to be “Katie” (the name of Mr Rothwells’ subsequent partner) and implicating her. Ironically, one of the police officers investigating the case said after the verdict that “The jury did not believe Makepeace’s lies and she is now going to pay the price for her cruel violence and deception.” This scepticism about Makepeace’s truthfulness did not extend to an obvious man’s claims of being a “woman” though, clearly.

The jury heard Makepeace transitioned in prison and began a sexual relationship with the victim in HMP Grendon (a category B men’s prison) in 2010, having been convicted of wounding after stabbing a stranger in the jaw and neck, causing him life-threatening injuries in 2007. Makepeace received an indeterminate prison sentence where an offender is kept in custody until they are deemed safe to release, rather than for a fixed, court-ordered term. His previous convictions included actual and grievous bodily harm, battery, affray, and assaulting a police officer, some of which were committed against then-partners. In fact, both men appear to be appallingly violent; Steven Rothwell appears to be the 18 year old Stephen Rothwell who was convicted of a frenzied attack on a convicted sex offender named Allan Lord on a Chorley street in 2002. He, too, was detained on an indeterminate sentence after punching, kicking and stamping the man to death. The court also heard that he indecently exposed himself to members of the deceased’s family.

Initial media reports of the murder in August 2025 named the person charged as a 42 year old “woman” and some persisted with this perversion of the truth at conviction, such as the major local newspaper Manchester Evening News where Makepeace’s trans status is not included in coverage despite his obvious male appearance. Even worse, the CPS – the public agency responsible for conducting criminal prosecutions in England and Wales – issued a deeply misleading tweet using female pronouns for Makepeace implying it was a woman who perpetrated this heinous crime. The tweet even including a bizarre video asking the viewer to believe a clip of obviously female hands were those of the man who stabbed Mr Rothwell to death. They received over 500 replies complaining about the deceit and a community note clarifying that no women were involved in this appalling male-on-male violence. The CPS then deleted the original tweet and issued a sorry-not-sorry follow-up.

Joan Smith, the feminist writer, further pointed out that in 2025 the CPS prosecuted trans-identified male Ciara Watkin (convicted of deceiving another man into having sex by pretending he was a woman) and the entire case turned on the fact that Watkin hid his status as a biological male. Yet the CPS went along with the deception by using female pronouns for him in a press release. It even referenced a text sent by Watkin in which “she” admitted to having male genitalia. 

As was pointed out by X/Twitter users, it is obvious who the CPS have been listening to (and who they have ignored) as they appointed a trans-identified male named Sophie Cook as a “speak out champion” in 2022 – someone who displays obvious animosity towards women, wants people who accidentally misgender him to be recorded as committing non-crime hate incidents and failed to declare alleged financial irregularities to a local selection panel when attempting to stand as a parliamentary candidate for East Worthing and Shoreham.

Image credit: Cheshire Constabulary via Manchester Evening News

Media reports

Unherd https://unherd.com/newsroom/why-is-the-cps-calling-male-killers-she/  archive

Rhyl Journal https://www.rhyljournal.co.uk/news/25939077.prestatyn-aurin-makepeace-speaks-murder-trial—day-10/  archive

Daily Mail https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15678893/Trans-woman-prison-stabbing-boyfriend.html  archive

Manchester Evening News https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/left-him-dead-caught-train-33661478  archive

BBC Tributes paid to man found dead at home https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9dxyx555p6o  

BBC Three murder arrests after man found dead at home https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwy0j3lze5yo

Lancashire Telegraph https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/5971859.youths-frenzied-attack-killed-sex-offender/  archive