Tell us why you murdered him, partner tells crossbow killer

THE PARTNER of a retired lecturer fatally shot with a crossbow has called for his murderer to reveal why he took his life.

Terence Whall, 39, was convicted at Mold Crown Court yesterday of killing Gerald Corrigan, 74, who was shot down as he adjusted a satellite dish outside his home in Anglesey, North Wales, in the early hours of April 19 last year.

The jury in the trial, which lasted more than four weeks, was told it may never know why Mr Corrigan was murdered.

North Wales Police said a parallel fraud investigation was ongoing after claims the pensioner and his partner Marie Bailey, 64, handed over £250,000 to convicted fraudster Richard Wyn Lewis before his death.

In a statement, Miss Bailey said: “To that sad, twisted, broken soul who murdered him, I say if you have an ounce of humanity, any sense of decency, then you would tell us now why you have done this.” Detective Chief Inspector Brian Kearney said Mr Corrigan may have become a “source or potential source of grief to local criminality”. Mr Corrigan’s daughter Fiona said: “The reason the news of the shooting was such a shock for us was that he was such a good man.”

The court heard the couple handed money over to Mr Lewis for a land deal, work to a house and a horse.

Mr Lewis, who remains under investigation, also grew cannabis in an outbuilding at their property but removed the drugs farm when Mr Corrigan realised the scale of the operation, the court heard.

DCI Kearney said a prosecution file on the fraud investigation, understood to involve three suspects, was awaiting review by the Crown Prosecution Service.

The court heard evidence that Whall, inset, and Gavin Jones, 36, who were both convicted of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice for a plot to set fire to Whall’s car, were also involved in a dispute over money with Mr Lewis.

Part way through the trial, Jones’s brother Darren Jones, 41, and his friend Martin Roberts, 34, pleaded guilty to the arson of the Land Rover Discovery.

Whall, Gavin Jones, Darren Jones and Roberts are due back in court on Friday when they will be sentenced.