A gangster who is serving a minimum 35-year jail sentence for executing three men has been awarded more than £800 in compensation after his nose hair clippers, alarm clock and stereo were damaged during a prison transfer.

Along with his brother Miran, Kevan Thakrar, who lived in Lomond Way in Stevenage, was jailed in 2008 for killing three men over a drug deal, and attempting to kill two women.

Keith Cowell, 52, his son Matthew, 17, and Tony Dulieu, 33, were lined up and shot with a Mac-10 sub-machine gun in Mr Cowell’s Bishop Stortford home in 2007.

Matthew Cowell’s girlfriend, Clare Evans, and a second woman, Christine Jennings, were stabbed after the killers ran out of ammunition. The women, who were targeted because they were witnesses, survived.

The shootings were over the alleged supply of low quality cocaine.

In 2010, Kevan Thakrar was being transferred from HMP Frankland in County Durham to HMP Woodhill in Milton Keynes after stabbing three guards with a broken bottle when he claims some of his property was lost, stolen or damaged.

The 26-year-old, who admitted the guard attacks but claimed self defence after ill-treatment at the high-security prison, was cleared of the attempted murder of two of the officers and the wounding with intent of the third.

The convicted killer went to court claiming stress from the damage to his nose trimmer, alarm clock and stereo, and the loss of photographs and letters.

He had already rejected an offer of £10 compensation from the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman.

District Judge Neil Hickman awarded Thakrar a total of £814.97, including £500 for the loss of photos and other personal items because the prison guards had not apologised.

“Had the defendants said promptly and sincerely to Mr Thakrar that they deeply regretted the loss of his personal items and understood his distress, the loss of them would not have been aggravated in the way that it has been,” he said.

He accused the guards of having “a somewhat cavalier disregard for Mr Thakrar’s rights and for his property”.

Thakrar was also awarded £224.97 for damage to his nose hair clippers, alarm clock and stereo, and £90 for the loss of his property, including protein powders and toiletries.

On his Facebook page, Thakrar wrote: “[Justice Secretary Chris] Grayling paid up. It is a shame though - I was quite looking forward to the bailiffs going into the Ministry of Justice.”