A convicted murderer and former aide to the Duchess of York has gone missing from an open prison, the Ministry of Justice said yesterday.

Jane Andrews, who is serving a life sentence for bludgeoning and stabbing her boyfriend to death, failed to return to East Sutton Park prison in Kent yesterday night.

A spokesman for the prison service said: "Jane Andrews is believed to have absconded from HMP East Sutton Park on November 22 after being found missing at the 8 p.m. roll-check.

"Police have been informed and are assisting with the search."

Ms Andrews was convicted in 2001 of murdering Tom Cressman at the house they shared in The Maltings, Fulham, south-west London. She was found guilty of hitting the wealthy businessman on the head with a cricket bat and then stabbing him. A jury at the Old Bailey accepted the prosecution case that she killed him in revenge because he refused to marry her.

Sources said Ms Andrews had just been moved to the Kent prison and took a paracetamol overdose last week, for which she needed hospital treatment.

A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: "We can confirm that a prisoner from HMP East Sutton Park was taken to outside hospital on November 19 and subsequently returned to prison."

Ms Andrews, who went on the run for four days after Mr Cressman's death, worked for the Duchess of York as a dresser for nine years until 1997.

She appealed against her murder conviction in 2003 on the grounds that she had been sexually abused by her brother as a child, which he vehemently denied.

She said the trauma damaged her personality and meant that she was not guilty of murder on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

This was dismissed by the Court of Appeal, along with claims that Mr Cressman had domestically abused and raped her.

Ms Andrews, who has been in open prison since July this year, will be eligible for release in 2012 when the parole board will decide if she can go free.