Ex-lover facing jail for faking will of murdered antiques dealer
THE ex-partner of a murdered Mayfair antiques dealer faked her will in an attempt to claim her £850,000 home.
Robert Webb, 54, was yesterday told by a judge he faces jail for dishonestly trying to get his hands on Robyn Mercer’s property in the Surrey stockbroker belt.
The former BT engineer was arrested on suspicion of killing the mother of two after she was found hacked to death on her driveway last year.
But murder squad detectives no longer believe he is responsible and arrested another mystery man last month. The suspect, and two other men both aged 26, face questions over whether they conspired to rob and burgle the keen rower and antique silver specialist.
Mrs Mercer, 50, was found face down in a pool of blood outside her West Molesey home in March 2016.
She had been attacked with an axe or machete as she took out the bins and her injuries were so severe that at first police believed she had been shot. Webb, a motorcycle enthusiast, was arrested within minutes of the gruesome discovery and questioned over two days before being released.
Relatives told investigators the pair had split but he refused to leave the semi- detached house where Mrs Mercer’s children Peter, 22, and Georgia, 18, were frequent visitors.
Police uncovered tensions within the family including suspicions that a genuine will by the murder victim had been hidden away.
Six months later Webb told police he had found her will inside a book and had it witnessed by his brother and a friend before sending it to his solicitors. But police called in a handwriting expert who discovered Mrs Mercer’s signature was forged in an attempt to claim the entire property.
Webb also claimed the two witnesses had seen the whole document, but they told officers the top half was obscured by a box.
Without the new ‘ will’ Webb was only in line to receive a 35 per cent share of the house which had soared in value since he and Mrs Mercer met in 2003. Prosecutor Lee Harris said: ‘A handwriting expert was asked to look at the will, who said there was very strong support for the proposition it was not her handwriting.’
Yesterday Webb pleaded guilty to a single charge of fraud at Kingston Crown Court. He will be sentenced later but was warned he faces jail.
His barrister Lyall Thompson claimed there was ‘no intention’ for the document to be accepted as real, something prosecutors reject. ‘It was intended to flush out the genuine will which he believed was in the possession of other family members,’ the barrister said.
Mrs Mercer, who was originally from Cape Town, worked for silver specialists J.H. Bourdon-Smith in London’s St James’s district for 25 years. Surrey Police are still working to build a case against her suspected murderer and there is a £10,000 reward for information leading to a conviction.
Last October police dredged a lake in Oxshott, Surrey, where two women linked to the suspects live, in a bid to trace the murder weapon. They have refused to discuss any details of the latest suspect after he was arrested on August 11. Mrs Mercer’s brother Quentin Spickernell, who runs a successful Cape Town restaurant, said the full circumstances of her murder remain a mystery.
He told the Daily Mail: ‘Robyn’s kids were with us for a long time, and they’re doing a lot better now, both have returned to the UK and full-time education.
‘Webb was very stupid with what he was attempting to do, and was unlikely to get away with it. Although we are told that he is not a suspect in the murder of my sister, we had our own misgivings about his integrity. The fact that he has admitted trying to fake her will supports our sense of unease about him.’
Mr Spickernell added that the suspect arrested last month is not directly connected to his sister or Webb in any way.
Two women aged 45 and 20, from Oxshott, arrested last year on suspicion of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, are no longer on police bail.
Det Chief Insp Paddy Mayers, who is leading the inquiry, said his team was ‘ committed to getting justice for Robyn and her family’.
‘It was not her handwriting’