A man convicted of killing two previous partners has been jailed for a minimum of 26 years for murdering his ex-girlfriend after she met another man.

Theodore Johnson was sentenced at the Old Bailey on Friday after pleading guilty on the first day of his trial to murdering mother-of-four and grandmother Angela Best with a claw hammer.

The 64-year-old had met Best while on day release from a secure mental hospital where he had been sent for killing a former partner in 1993. Twelve years earlier, in 1981, he was jailed for killing his wife by pushing her over a balcony.

After attacking Best, 51, at his Islington home on 15 December 2016, the garage worker threw himself in front of an express train, which resulted in him losing his right arm and left hand.

Johnson now uses a wheelchair.

Police discovered Best’s body when they called at Johnson’s flat to find his family after the incident at Cheshunt railway station.

Johnson’s long-term relationship with Best ended in 2016 when she met someone else.

A post-mortem concluded she died from neck compression by strangulation and blunt force trauma to the head.

Johnson was jailed for three years in 1981 after being convicted of manslaughter over the death of his wife, Yvonne Johnson, who he pushed off their ninth-floor balcony after hitting her on the head with a vase.

Twelve years later, in 1993, Johnson pleaded guilty to manslaughter, on the grounds of diminished responsibility, after attacking former partner Yvonne Bennett.

He was sent to a secure hospital indefinitely after killing her while their baby daughter slept nearby

After strangling his ex-partner with a belt, Johnson phone police to confess before trying to take his own life.

Johnson was conditionally discharged from the secure mental health facility in 1997.