A 'sexually obsessed' killer who drove 100 miles to murder his teenage stepdaughter at her university accommodation has been jailed for life.
Nathan Owens, 34, who strangled Carla Georgescu, will serve a minimum term of 35 years before he can be considered for parole.
He was sentenced this morning by Mr Justice Jacobs at Preston Crown Court, who told him: 'You have not demonstrated any remorse for what you did.
'You took victim blaming to its limit by suggesting she had taken her own life. Her mother had to come and give evidence.
'This demonstrates how despicable you are.'
He said the attack on Ms Georgescu was preplanned and sadistic, with Owens prepared to kill her to ensure he was not identified as the man who had sexually violated her.
Owens displayed no emotion as he strolled from the dock with his hands behind his back.
During his trial, jurors heard how depraved Owens drove through the night to carry out his vile crime in February.
Nathan Owens was today handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 35 years
Mr Justice Jacobs added: 'The last 90 minutes of Carla's life are too horrendous even to think about.
'It is clear that she did try to put up a fight, and she was aware of what was happening to her, certainly when she was attacked with a knife and suffered defensive injuries.
'It is likely, and indeed it is to be hoped, that at some point she became unconscious as a result of the blows to her head, so that she was not aware of everything that happened to her.
'But I am sure that she suffered both mentally and physically during a material part of those 90 minutes.'
Owens had smirked and flicked his hair yesterday as he was found guilty of murdering Ms Georgescu, a student at the University of Lancashire, in Preston.
In a statement, Lancashire Police said today: 'Carla had her whole life ahead of her. She was described by a professional as 'intelligent, gentle and articulate'.
'She was a student in Preston, studying Clinical Psychology at undergraduate, with plans for the future to take post-graduate studies in Romania.
'Carla had friends, in fact, she was meant to travel to Romania the day after she was found, (going) with her friend, to meet her boyfriend for the first time.
'Owens took all of that away from her.'
The court heard that after the killing, he then returned home to Carla's mother and was seen calmly shopping in Asda with her, while his stepdaughter was lying undiscovered.
The depraved 'coward' remained silent throughout his police interviews and refused to give evidence in court, enabling him to dodge being cross-examined.
He then shocked onlookers by smiling and laughing from his seat in the glass-panelled dock while the grotesque details of Carla's killing were spelt out during his three-week trial.
Carla Georgescu, 19, who was murdered by her stepfather at her university accommodation
Speaking outside court today, Det Insp Pete Macdonald said: 'Carla Georgescu had her whole life ahead of her. She was a second year student at university.
'She had friends, she had a new boyfriend and she was about to cdelebrate her 20th birthday.
'Her life was cruelly snatched away from her by a man she should have been able to trust.
'Nathan Owens had the responsibility of being welcomed into their family.
'He should have loved Carla as his own but he abused that trust by harbouring a perverted infatuation with her before he killed her.
'Owens offending ended with the worst possible outcome, the loss of Carla's life, but the way it began is equally disturbing.
'He took innocent childhood photographs and made them into indecent images of Carla.
'He travelled to Preston from Hartlepool in the middle of the night to brutally murder Carla. He killed her then staged the room to make it look like a suicide.
Preston Crown Court, where Owens was sentenced today for Carla Georgescu's murder
'He believed if he couldn't have her, nobody could. He disposed of evidence on his way home before walking through his front door `as if nothing has happened.
'He was truly despicable.
'Carla had a future that deserved to be lived and enjoyed and that was takeaway from her.'
Carla's flatmate and friend Jennifer Louise Kirkham, 19, was in tears as she described how she failed to hear the violent assault because she had gone to bed without her hearing aid.
She attended many days of the hearing and said of the killer: 'I wanted to see him, I wanted to know what happened as I slept. She was so young.
'It's unfair really to think that she went through all that, an hour and half it lasted, while I was sleeping.
'I have seen comments asking how could the roommates not hear anything and I apologise that I don't wear my hearing aids to sleep.'
Ms Kirkham described Owens as 'narcissistic', adding: 'Every time I looked at him he was smiling or just looking bored.
'He laughed when he heard the guilty verdict. He actually laughed quietly to himself like it was some inside joke. The rage that I felt.
'He was supposed to look after her. He stood up to take the role of a father and he didn't because for some sick, twisted reason his desires was more important than her life.
'I will never understand the cruelty and twisted nature of somebody who could something like that.'
Now sporting a full head of hair, Owens sat in the dock with his legs casually crossed and his arms across his stomach as the verdicts were announced on Thursday.
Jurors convicted him of murdering Carla after deliberating for just over three hours.
It can now be revealed that Owens previously pleaded guilty to making indecent images of Carla. He will be sentenced on Friday.
While exactly what happened in the early hours of February 4 may never be revealed, prosecutors suggested he was motivated by 'sexual jealousy'.
Owens had learnt that Carla - a second-year clinical psychology student - was planning a trip to her native Romania to meet a man she had been romantically involved with online, prosecutors had claimed.
A talented artist, Carla - who moved to the UK while still at school - was described as 'intelligent, gentle and articulate'.
Owens hid his secret depravity after marrying her mother, Janina.
But his trial heard how his 'escalating fascination' with Carla included having sex with a life-sized 'effigy' of his teenage stepdaughter which he had clothed in her nightdress.
A day before Carla was due to travel, Owens duped her into letting him into her student flat at 4am.
His intention was 'to satisfy his sexual needs, come what may', prosecutor Nicholas Lumley KC said in his closing speech at Preston Crown Court.
As he listened in silence, Mr Lumley asked whether Owens had treated Carla 'like a doll, like one of your effigies' before killing her when she 'dared to say no' to him.
Police initially suspected Carla's death was suicide, after her body was found slumped against a wardrobe door with a belt around her neck on February 5.
The horrific reality was revealed by CCTV, which proved the account Owens later gave police - that his wife Janina accompanied him in the early hours of the previous day - to be a lie.
In addition, damning evidence provided by his car's GPS system revealed how he had stopped on the way home to dispose of crucial evidence.
Arriving home to Hartlepool shortly after 8am on February 4, Owens did not tell his psychotherapist wife that he had been to see her daughter.
And she became worried when Carla did not respond to her messages and calls.
Instead CCTV footage captured him casually shopping in Asda with his partner Janina.
The following day – which would have been Carla's 20th birthday – she contacted university security.
They then carried out a welfare check and discovered her body.
Police broke the news to the couple, with Carla's death initially put down to suicide.
Yet within hours, Owens was carrying out web searches about how police investigate suspicious deaths while also wiping his electronic devices.
He later gave Mrs Georgescu a false story about having gone to Preston that night because Carla had wanted him to take incontinence pants to her and help tidy her room.
And when police started to become suspicious, Owens lied that he and his wife had been to see Carla together.
But CCTV footage revealed he had travelled there and back alone.
A clip played to the trial shows Carla – wearing a fluffy dressing gown and pyjamas – letting Owens into Ribble Hall, her block of student flats at the University of Lancashire, at around 4am on February 4, his head hidden by a patterned blanket.
He was captured leaving the building around an hour-and-a-half later, 'shielding' himself with an umbrella and wearing a face-mask while wearing Carla's trainers and carrying two bags.
Following his arrest, detectives were able to piece together his movements after the murder by downloading telematics information from the couple's Ford Puma.
It pinpointed exactly where he stopped during the journey home, with searches of the surrounding area revealing Carla's discarded mobile phone, her bloodied bedding and a blood-stained T-shirt.
Mrs Georgescu had last seen Carla three days before her death during an early birthday celebration at a Korean restaurant in Preston.
She had travelled from Hartlepool by train for the meal, where they were later joined by Owens, who came by car.
Footage shows Owens and Carla both looking uncomfortable and staring at their phones after being left alone at the table during dinner.
Owens had become 'sexually fixated' with Carla, prosecutors alleged, secretly taking pictures of her dressed in her underwear.
His 'depraved' actions included having sex with an 'effigy' of Carla as well as her dolls and toys, and manipulating an innocent image of her so it appeared sexual.
But his 'dark life' was hidden from his wife, who had no idea he was staying up all night obsessing over Carla, the trial heard.
Owens was also convicted of grievous bodily harm with intent.
After the verdicts, Detective Inspector Pete Macdonald, of Lancashire Police, said: 'Carla was a young woman with her whole life ahead of her, a life that was taken away by someone she should have been able to trust.
'Owens had a despicable, perverted sexual obsession with his stepdaughter, an obsession that ended with him killing her. He has now been brought to justice for his crimes.
'No verdict brings Carla back, but I hope that her mum and the rest of her loved ones can feel some sense of justice that the man responsible for taking her future away has been brought to justice.'
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