Woman who killed her estranged husband fantasized about having sex with lover while drenched in his blood
A woman and her partner have been found guilty of murdering her estranged husband after he refused to divorce her.
Angela Taylor and her partner Paul Cannon shared "a venomous hatred" for her estranged husband William "Bill" Taylor for his refusal to divorce her, a St. Albans Crown Court heard, according to BBC.
In February, a fisherman stumbled upon the 69-year-old's skeletal remains near Hitchin, Hertfordshire, almost eight months after he was reported missing.
Judge Michael Kay QC convicted both Taylor and Cannon of murder and arson, and scheduled their sentencing for Friday, November 8. "There is only one sentence that can be passed and it will be a life sentence," he told the pair in court.
Meanwhile, 60-year-old Gwyn Griffiths, a colleague of Cannon's from Folkestone, Kent, was cleared of conspiracy to commit murder.
On June 4, 2018, Taylor was reported missing by his lodger, just days after his Land Rover was reportedly set on fire. DNA recovered from the burnt vehicle matched that of Cannon.
The trial heard how Taylor, 53, and Cannon, 54, exchanged explicit messages over WhatsApp, fantasizing about killing Taylor. They were seen in the messages discussing "the best way" to kill the farmer and hurt his family, including references to chainsaws, barbed wire, and pickaxes.
The cruel pair also described various scenarios in the conversation, saying how it was "a turn-on" for them. "Just watching Kill Bill 2 lol," Cannon wrote in a message to Taylor the night their victim disappeared. The gruesome pair also shared fantasies of showering together as Bill's blood ran down the drain after they hack his ligaments and fingers off.
Cannon told Taylor in the months leading up to the death he was afraid of losing her and would even "kill for" her. "You know what I'd like to do... make love to you on his kitchen table with your p***y soaked in blood with him tied to a chair so he had to watch!!!!!!!" he wrote in the messages. "Then send him to hell."
While talking to police, Cannon said the messages "between Angela and me related to no more than fantasy and banter of an extreme nature."
Meanwhile, Angela claimed to have sent the messages "out of frustration" as Bill was "getting on her nerves". "It will become apparent that he and she shared and encouraged in each other in a venomous hatred for William Taylor," prosecutor John Price QC had said earlier in the trial. "They loathed him."
That said, Taylor's body was reportedly so badly decomposed that it was impossible to determine a cause of death, experts told the court. When his remains were found, the farmer was still wearing his boots and blue overalls. Taylor probably died after getting "stuck in mud" and he might have gone to the area for a picnic, the defense argued in court.
Furthermore, there was no sign of blunt force injuries, no gunshot or stab wounds, and no evidence of toxic substances, according to forensic pathologist Dr. Charlotte Randall. However, forensic experts did find a "possible fracture" to the hyoid bone in the neck, which they said could have been a result of compression.