A tribunal established by the British Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) found that six officers had failed in their duty to protect 26-year-old Tania Moore, who was subjected to "a year of terror" before being shot dead by Mark Dyche in March 2004.

One officer was sacked from the police as a result of the tribunal, which found that the officer had failed to take seriously numerous complaints by the victim against her former fiance. A further five officers were reprimanded, including one senior officer who was demoted as a result of his failure to protect Moore.

The young showjumper, whose late grandfather Paddy Moore is regarded as one of the greatest ever Irish soccer internationals, made a total of six complaints to police against Dyche. The most serious complaint revolved around an assault that took place on her in June 2003, when she was attacked by two men in her home in Alkmonton, Derbyshire, and beaten with a baseball bat.

Although Dyche did not take part in the robbery and assault, Moore had informed police that she believed her former fiance to have organised the attack.

Pat Moore, father of the deceased, told the Sunday Tribune this weekend that the family believed that Tania might still be alive had the police properly investigated the six complaints made against Dyche. "The police never followed up any leads they were given by Tania, " he said.

"She told them that he [Dyche] was threatening her and gave details of all these incidents but nothing was ever done about it."

Two police officers have now appealed the IPCC tribunal's decision. The local chief constable, David Coleman, has until 6 December to rule on the appeal. Should he uphold the decision, the officers have the option of appealing to the Home Office.

The IPCC Commissioner, Amerdeep Somal, described the police investigation into the robbery and assault of Tania Moore as "abysmal". "No one individual officer took control of the investigation into the robbery and through collective individual failuresf no meaningful investigation ever took place, " she said. "The investigation was signed off as undetected when, in reality, simple basic lines of enquiry were never pursued."

Tania Moore's engagement to Dyche ended in February 2003, after which he made repeated threats to kill her. He had one previous conviction for threatening to kill his ex-wife in 1993, while a charge of harassing his girlfriend in 1999 was dismissed.

Moore made six separate complaints to police regarding Dyche's behaviour.

She was shot dead on 29 March, 2004, after Dyche ran her car off the road before shooting her at point-blank range. Despite his violent history, Dyche was granted a full gun licence. Derbyshire Constabulary was urged to review its gun licensing policy in the wake of Tania Moore's murder.