Woman, 63, ‘claimed father’s pension for 11 years after burying his body in garden’
A WOMAN appeared in court yesterday accused of murdering her father and burying his body in the back garden.
Barbara Coombes, 63, is also accused of fraudulently claiming her father Kenneth’s pension for 11 years.
Coombes, of Reddish, Stockport, who has a 29-year-old daughter, sparked a murder investigation last Sunday after walking into a police station.
Officers later found the body of her father Kenneth, who was in his 80s, in the back garden of the family home.
Coombes made a three-minute appearance before a district judge at Manchester and Salford magistrates court yesterday.
Wearing black-rimmed spectacles and a brown woollen jumper, stocky, white-haired Coombes spoke only to confirm her name, address and date of birth.
She is accused of murder on January 8, 2006, and preventing the lawful and decent burial of a body between January 2006 and January 2018.
The former factory worker is also accused of fraud by false representation between January 2007 and January 2018.
The details of that charge are that she dishonestly sent official letters in her father’s name, intending to claim monies not belonging to herself.
The final charge is obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception between January 2006 and January 2007 by claiming she was her father’s carer.
Coombes gave no reaction to the charges as she was handcuffed to a prison officer and remanded in custody.
Deputy District Judge David Scanlon said the court had only one option and remanded her to appear this morning at Manchester Crown Court.
Earlier this week her former husband Bill, 63, a bricklayer, revealed that Coombes was suffering from stomach cancer.
Since Coombes walked into Cheadle Heath police station last weekend officers from Greater Manchester Police have gone from door to door in the area handing out a questionnaire to neighbours.
Detectives have been asking them if they have seen Kenneth Coombes, saying he would have been in his late 80s in 2005.
Relatives described Mr Coombes – who served as a bombardier in the Royal Regiment of Artillery in the Second World War – as “difficult”.
He originally lived with wife Mary, two sons and daughter Barbara at the semi-detached house but his wife left him, taking the two sons with her before she later died.
Barbara Coombes is understood to have moved back in with her father after she split from her husband.
The results of a Home Office post-mortem examination have not been disclosed, so it is not yet known how he died.
Detective Inspector Dan Clegg, of Greater Manchester Police’s major incident team, said: “I would like to thank the community for their support as we continue to carry out our inquiries.”