Vietnamese woman raped, tortured and killed by men who had murdered before
THE sister of a woman who was tortured and murdered by two convicted killers told a court her sister believed Britain was a safe country, and that she could not understand how they were freed on licence.
Stephen Unwin, 40, and William Mcfall, 51, murdered Quyen Ngoc Nguyen, a Vietnamese nail technician, after a four-hour ordeal and then dumped her body in her car before torching it last August. They were both handed whole-life jail terms yesterday.
Ms Nguyen had been lured to Unwin’s home in Shiney Row, near Sunderland, where Mcfall lay in wait, Newcastle Crown Court heard. Unwin went on to rape the 28-year-old, who was just 5ft and weighed seven stone.
Quynh Ngoc Nguyen, 35, the victim’s sister, read a victim statement, saying: “We cannot comprehend how men like this can live freely in this country.
“My sister believed, as I did, that you came to this country for a safer life, with better opportunities for herself and her children.”
She said their parents and her sister’s two children had been left heartbroken by the actions of the murderers.
“They did not act like human beings, they are evil,” she said.
Unwin had a history of setting fires to destroy evidence at the scenes of his crimes.
He battered a pensioner to death while breaking-in to his home on Christmas Day 1998, and the fire he started to cover his tracks meant the victim could only be identified by his medical records. Unwin admitted murder, was sentenced to life and was released on licence in December 2012. He met Mcfall in the prison system, where he was also serving life for murdering a pensioner.
Mcfall attacked his victim with a hammer after she disturbed him while breaking into her home in Carrickfergus in May 1996. He was jailed for life then released on licence in October 2010.
Sentencing the two men, Mr Justice Morris, who was interrupted by Mcfall throughout, said: “Stephen Unwin, you are a calculating, manipulative and
‘We cannot comprehend how men like this can live freely in this country … they are evil’
ruthless killer [and] William John Mcfall, you are an extremely violent man capable of monstrous behaviour.
“It is against this background that I have considered whether the circumstances of this murder are such that it is one of those exceptional cases where its seriousness is of such a magnitude so as to require the making of a wholelife order. In my judgment, they are.
“You have both murdered before. On this occasion you did so in a coldblooded and callous manner having lulled your victim into a trap. She suffered an unimaginable ordeal.
“Both during and after that ordeal, the two of you casually went about your everyday tasks, chillingly devoid of any human empathy.”