The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
‘I’ll see you when I get out.’
St Andrews killer issues chilling threat as he is jailed for 17 years.
A callous Fife man who murdered his sister in her own home issued a chilling threat to distraught relatives just seconds after being jailed for life.
Charles Gordon, 52, shouted at family members “I’ll see you when I get out” after being sentenced at the High Court in Glasgow for murdering Elizabeth Bowe in St Andrews last year.
Judge John Morris told Gordon he will have to spend at least 17 years in prison before even being considered for release and that parole would not be automatically granted.
The court also heard Gordon was not in the best of health and was unlikely to live past the minimum jail term.
Gordon was convicted following a trial earlier this year of deliberately killing Ms Bowe by placing his hands around her neck and compressing it, putting a dressing gown around her neck and placing a plastic bag over her head at a flat in Bobby Jones Place on September 17.
The jury previously heard how Gordon himself phoned 999 to tell police he thought he had killed his sister, and when officers arrived they found him casually smoking a cigarette while his sibling lay unresponsive at his feet.
Ms Bowe was rushed to Ninewells Hospital in Dundee but died on September 20 as a result of the catastrophic brain injuries she suffered at Gordon’s hands.
At the sentencing yesterday, defence solicitor Iain Paterson told the court Gordon had been the subject of a vicious assault in May 2012 in which he suffered six fractured ribs and spent 18 days in hospital.
A year later he contracted pneumonia and was in hospital for 20 days, the solicitor continued, meaning that his health is “not pretty good”.
“He doesn’t see himself surviving or living far beyond his 52 years,” he added.
Mr Paterson also urged the judge to take into account that Ms Bowe’s murder had not been “pre-planned”.
“It is also of some importance that he did immediately contact the authorities by phoning the police, and I think some credit has to be given for that,” he said.
After his sentence was passed there was an angry exchange between Gordon and family members in court, in which Gordon said: “I’ll see you when I get out.”
One relative, thought to be Ms Bowe’s son, shouted something back about a “razor blade” and called Gordon a “junkie b ****** ” before he was led away.