Slain antiques dealer sought court order to keep ex away
AN ANTIQUES dealer who was bludgeoned to death in her driveway had sought a court order to gain protection from her ex-boyfriend just weeks before she was murdered, a court has heard.
Mystery continues to surround the death of Robyn Mercer, 50, who was killed with either an axe or a machete when putting the bins out in March last year.
Six months after her death, Robert Webb, 54 – whom she had dated for 13 years and who refused to leave the house they shared after they split in November 2015 – faked her will.
The ex-BT engineer was arrested on suspicion of killing the mother of two – but detectives no longer believe he is responsible. Webb was jailed for eight months yesterday for forging Miss Mercer’s will to try to get his hands on the £600,000 home in West Molesey, Surrey.
And Kingston Crown Court also heard Webb had previously been told to leave the property and that Miss Mercer asked her solicitors to draft a non-molestation and an exclusion order against him the month before her death, only to deinstruct them a fortnight before she died.
Non-molestation orders are designed to prevent someone from using or threatening to use violence, while an occupation order determines who is allowed to live in a house.
Webb was walking the dogs when Miss Mercer was killed. When he was told the house was to be sold last September, he claimed he had ‘finally located’ her will inside a book, with the document giving him sole control of the house. But he had actually forged her signature and got two friends to act as witnesses.
Recorder Ian Peddie QC said this ‘mean and callous offence greatly exacerbated the emotional distress’ for Miss Mercer’s children Peter, 21, and Georgia, 17.
Eighteen months on, no one has been charged with Miss Mercer’s murder.