I’d kill whining lifer with my bare hands
Channel 4 series brings heartache back for grieving relative of brutal murder victim
THE heartbroken niece of a man bludgeoned to death by his brother-inlaw has spoken of her fury after his killer moaned to a TV show about his life in jail.
Murderer James Smith, 60, compared his time at maximum security Shotts prison to “being dead” on last night’s Channel 4 documentary Lifers Behind Bars.
His words left the niece of Alexander Cameron, who he brutally murdered with an axe and a sledgehammer and buried under horse manure less than three years ago, reeling.
Louise Cameron, 54, said: “He killed my uncle and buried him and thinks he’s got the right to say it feels like he’s dead.
“He can phone his wife twice a day. Well, he’s lucky because I can’t speak to or see my uncle ever again.
“This has brought everything back and makes me sick to the bottom of my stomach. I’d kill him with my bare hands if he was in front of me.”
Smith murdered Alex, 67, by crushing his skull with the weapons at the victim’s farm in Kirknewton, West Lothian, in January 2015.
Louise says she reported Alexander missing when he failed to turn up at a family funeral in Edinburgh.
His body – with his ankles and wrists bound – was found a week later buried at the farm under manure and paving slabs.
Later that year, a jury found Smith guilty of murder. He was later sentenced at the High Court in Edinburgh to at least 17 years in prison.
Smith claims he killed Alexander in self-defence as he feared he’d shoot his wife.
In the programme, Smith described his grisly crime as “a survival thing”.
He said: “It’s nothing to be proud of or boastful or anything like that. It was wrong. But I’ve still got to justify it to myself, that I did the right thing – even though it was the wrong thing.
“I was cornered. It was over and done with in seconds. Killing somebody is the easiest thing in the world to do. It happens that quick and that easy, whether you mean it or you don’t.”
Quizzed on why he tried to cover up his crime, he said: “My wife would have been dead that night. He would’ve killed her.”
Asked if he sees himself as a murderer, he said: “A killer, not a murderer. I killed a man. I had reasons.”
Louise is now estranged from her uncle’s relatives following the death of her dad last year.