Monster tortured puppy then hacked wife into 224 pieces
A ‘CONTROLLING’ husband murdered his wife before chopping up her body and dumping parts in a bag for life in a river.
Nicholas Metson, 28, had then joked to police that Holly Bramley ‘ might be hiding under the bed’ when officers were searching for her, a judge was told.
The 26-year-old’s remains – in 224 pieces – were eventually found eight days after she was last seen.
The couple, who had been married just 16 months, were on the verge of separating when Metson repeatedly knifed her at their flat. Afterwards, he searched online to ask, ‘ What benefits do I get if my wife has died?’ and ‘Can someone haunt me after they die?’
The court heard that Metson had previously received a domestic violence referral and had a conviction for disclosing private sexual photographs – both in relation to previous partners – and also had a cruel streak towards animals. The
Mail can also reveal that Metson had previously punished his wife by gruesomely killing their pets.
He once put Ms Bramley’s new puppy in a washing machine – leaving her to discover the dead dog inside with the drum still spinning, a source said.
Ms Bramley had also confided that her partner had killed her hamsters by putting them in a food blender and the microwave oven. And she had once fled to a police station with her pet rabbits to escape him.
The source said Ms Bramley ‘never explained why he had done it [killed the animals]’ and they believed she was ‘controlled and manipulated’ by her husband. ‘She told us she loved him,’ they added, ‘but the first time I met him, I took an instant dislike to him.’
Gordon Aspden KC, prosecuting, said police had launched a murder investigation after body parts belonging to Ms Bramley, a triplet, were found in the River Witham, Lincolnshire, in March last year.
Police received a call expressing concern for Ms Bramley’s safety on March 24. When they visited the couple’s flat in Lincoln, there were bloodstained sheets in the bath, a saw on the kitchen floor and a strong smell of bleach.
Metson said his wife had left days earlier and during another search that afternoon, he ‘joked she might be hiding under the bed’, Lincoln Crown Court heard.
The next day, a member of the public spotted a number of plastic bags and a ‘bag for life’ floating in the river at Bassingham. Inside one, they found a severed hand. Police divers found 224 separate remains.
In a statement, Ms Bramley’s mother Annette said that ‘evil monster’ Metson’s controlling and coercive behaviour had left the family unable to see her daughter in the years before she died.
In February, Metson pleaded guilty to murder and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice by disposing of Ms Bramley’s body.
His friend Joshua Hancock, 28, of Waddington, has pleaded guilty to obstructing a coroner by helping to dispose her remains.
Allison Summers KC, defending, said that Metson’s diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder was a factor in the murder and there was no evidence of planning or an intention to kill. Metson and Hancock will be sentenced on Monday.
‘Put hamsters in a food blender’