A FREED killer who stabbed a man to death after he was released from prison was jailed for 12 years yesterday.

Alan Shreenan, 32, fled the country after his second fatal knife attack but was extradited from Ireland following a BBC Crimewatch appeal.

Shreenan is one of the few killers in Scotland who has struck again after his release from a jail sentence.

At the High Court in Edinburgh, Lady Cosgrove ordered that after Shreenan finished his 12-year sentence he serve an extended sentence for a further three years, when he can be recalled to prison.

Lady Cosgrove said she would provide ''additional protection to the public'' following his release.

Shreenan fatally stabbed Robert McKenna, 36, a former council care worker, during the knife attack in April 1999.

Mr McKenna, of Frazer Avenue, Helensburgh, was struck with a gold club and knifed seven times in the head, back and chest during the assault which killed him. Shreenan, of Darleith Road, Cardross, Dunbartonshire, was originally charged with murdering his victim.

He claimed he acted in self-defence when Mr McKenna and his girlfriend, Christine Phillips, 28, arrived armed at his door.

The jury convicted him of culpable homicide on the grounds of provocation.

Shreenan was jailed for seven years in 1992 for killing 27-year-old Sean Gillespie in Bonhill. Mr Gillespie's sister, Pat, who was in court to watch proceedings, said: ''At least we saw justice being done for some other poor family today.

''He got seven years for killing my brother and he only did 18 months. My mother is dead because of it. My two nephews were left without a father.''

The court earlier heard that there had been bad blood between Miss Phillips and Shreenan's partner, Linda Elliot, 38.

On the night Mr McKenna and Miss Phillips went to the house in Cardross, Miss Phillips said, Shreenan rushed out of the front door, punched her to the ground and stabbed Mr McKenna to death before vanishing.