A DIVORCE lawyer with a firm of Kent solicitors who was named as a secret lover in a murder trial will continue in his job.

James Muir-Little, who is a partner with Canterbury-based Furley Page, is said to have met a woman via a ‘swingers’ sex website.

But when her husband discovered the affair, he killed their daughter in a jealous rage to ‘punish’ his wife.

The involvement of Mr Muir-Little, who lives at Boughton, was revealed at the trial in Northampton in which the husband, Gavin Hall, was sentenced to life for murdering his three-year-old child.

Senior partner at Furley Page, David Hall, said Mr Muir-Little was not at work when the Gazette contacted the office on Friday.

He said: "As far as I know, he is at home. All this came as a bolt out of the blue to us. The first we knew about it was when we read it in the newspapers."

He added that the partners had not had a chance to speak to Mr Muir-Little or consider the matter.

But in a statement on Tuesday, a spokesman for the Furley Page said: "James Muir-Little has been with the firm for 13 years and will continue as a partner. We appreciate the difficult time he and his family have experienced."

Mr Muir-Little, whose GP wife Dr Jane Lilley is a partner in the Canterbury Health Centre and Sturry Surgery, was not at their home in The Street, Boughton, when the Gazette tried to contact him at the weekend.

The lawyer, who is an advanced member of the Law Society’s Family Law Panel, has only recently been appointed a deputy circuit judge for the South East.

The trial heard that he called himself David Newton Cummins to advertise on the website and began an affair after making contact with nurse Joanne Rainsley.

The pair are said to have twice stayed at a Travelodge in Kettering last year.

But their affair was discovered by her husband when he found email correspondence with Mr Muir-Little on her computer and a letter from Travelodge.